


Another Way to Die

by AnchoredTether



Category: Danny Phantom, Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Alternate Universe - Ghost Hunters, Angst, Angst and Humor, Body Horror, Character Turned Into a Ghost, Claustrophobia, Danny Phantom AU, Dark, Disturbing Themes, Double Life, F/M, Ghost!Lance, Graphic Description, Heavy Angst, Hurt/Comfort, Keith is also half ghost, Kinda, Lance is turned into a half ghost and the Holts are the scientists, Pidge is slightly goth, Slight Horror Elements, Slow Burn, again kinda
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-30
Updated: 2019-08-01
Packaged: 2020-07-23 23:07:30
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 13
Words: 50,023
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20016283
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AnchoredTether/pseuds/AnchoredTether
Summary: "So this is how I die. In some Holt laboratory device when ALL I WANTED WAS STRING CHEESE!"Alternatively ; the Danny Phantom Plance AU no one asked for.





	1. The Ghost in the Machine

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here is my contribution for the [Plance Mini Bang!](https://planceminibang.tumblr.com/)  
> A special thank you to [amicuscordis](https://amicuscordis.tumblr.com/) for beta-ing! Vague summary is vague.
> 
> The lovely [numbah34](https://numbah34.tumblr.com/) made several arts for this work and they are fantastic!  
> Check out her art [here](https://numbah34.tumblr.com/post/186646337968/the-stranger-looked-a-hundred-percent-done-you)! And there is more concept art which I will link once it's posted~

“We should probably get back to studying,” Pidge announced after both their characters died on the retro gaming system and the eight-bit funeral dirge played. “Since, you know, you came over here to study.”

“Yeah yeah, I know…” Lance sighed. He currently had a D in his physics class and Pidge happened to be a genius at anything related to science, so they started study sessions at her place a few weeks ago. “I needed a break though! All this talk of kinetics and energy was putting my head for a spin.”

“Killbot has killed us seven times in a row so I think that’s as good a time as any to quit while we’re ahead.”

“Seven times the charm?” Lance put down the controller and pulled his textbook back onto his lap, stretching his legs out onto the coffee table. “Maaaan, who studies on a Friday night??”

“Smart people who want all day Saturday and Sunday to themselves.”

He snapped his book shut again and stood up. “You know what? I’m starving. I’ll be right back with some snacks.”

She sighed. “You have the attention span of a magpie, Lance.” After five good minutes of studying he’d go on some tangent and she had to redirect his attention, or he’d want to do a video game break or a snack break or a bathroom break and she swore that boy drank water like an alcoholic downs free shots because he was constantly needing to relieve himself. When she called him out on ‘faking’ bathroom breaks to get out of studying he simply lifted up his massive water bottle and told her he drank six of them a day. He progressed on a long spiel about how great water was and she couldn’t decide whether she was impressed by how much science he had to back up his arguments or annoyed by the fact that he couldn’t shut up about water.

She called out to him as he started down the hallway. “Can you bring me some peanut butter cookies? They’re on the top shelf of the fridge.” He held up a hand to indicate he heard and she pulled out homework from one of her advanced placement classes to work on while she waited for his return.

The Holt house was confusing. The whole family was geniuses - Sam was a revered engineer and Colleen a brilliant chemist and botanist. Half the rooms in the house were labs or conservatories (or a combination) and so many parts of the house were added on or obscure extensions that made it a strange maze of plants and machinery. Lance usually had to ask Pidge to remind him which way was to the bathroom or kitchen but he didn’t want to bother her this time. It shouldn’t have been too hard to figure out, right? He had an innate sense of direction.

The other issue was the fact that Sam upgraded all their normal appliances. Their washer and dryer did not look like the standard because he invented ones that worked better. Lance found a room that might possibly be a kitchen but just as easily a lab. There were a few black knives left on one of the counters and some strange looking vegetables. Knives and vegetables were found together in kitchens, right? Then again, half the rooms had vegetables, but he figured a kitchen utensil and an edible looking plant had to be a good indicator. 

He walked up to what looked like could be a fridge and tried pulling the giant red lever that could have been the door handle. When nothing opened for him, Lance let out a dissatisfied hum and walked over to some double doors that might have been a pantry or fridge and pulled them open. They were heavy and made a hissing and whirring sound as they slowly opened. The area inside was well lit and the walls looked like they were lined with drawers, but when he walked up and tried pulling on one of the panels it wouldn’t budge.

“Pidge distinctly said ‘shelf.’ So obviously whatever this is, it’s not the refrigerator.” He took one last look before turning to leave, but the doors just barely finished closing on their own without a sound. He let out a short yelp before rushing over and pushing on the thick metal doors but there were no handles and they weren’t budging against his weight. Suddenly the lights in the room snapped into an electric green and he could hear an ominous whirring of something powering up gradually increase in volume.

He pounded on the door, yelling Pidge and her parents’ names in a vain attempt to grab someone’s attention. He started to panic, looking around frantically for some escape latch or emergency button within the walls of the room. When he exhausted all his options he backed up into a corner and braced himself for whatever was about to happen, his limbs plastered against the walls. 

“So this is how I die.” He sucked in a sharp breath. “In some Holt laboratory device when ALL I WANTED WAS STRING CHEESE!”

The lights turned off and he screamed, but his scream slowly died out as he realized he wasn’t being evaporated. Nothing happened except for a sudden nausea that overcame him and then his senses quickly faded into blackness.

* * *

When Lance came to, he was lying on the ground of the fridge-not-fridge, the hospital-white lights were back on, and the double doors were left open. He looked over his body and patted himself in random spots and let out a sigh of relief. He seemed to be alright and figured he simply passed out from fear and adrenaline. He stood up and quickly left the room, finding his way back to Pidge.

“You can’t find the fridge, can you?” she asked in a dour tone.

She didn’t seem concerned that he was gone for a long time, so Lance figured he was only passed out for a minute or so. It would have been logical to tell her what had just happened but a part of him hesitated. Nothing happened and he didn’t want to get in trouble with her parents. He didn’t want _her_ to get in trouble with her parents when _he_ was being an idiot. He’d seen the way Colleen and Pidge interacted and Mrs. Holt was a scary woman when she wanted to be. He let out a nervous laugh before answering. “No, it appears I’m helpless at your house.”

Pidge stood up as she finished typing something on her phone, her green-painted nails clacking against the touch screen as she led the way without having to look up. “Follow me, goofball.”

They acquired the snacks from the strangely designed fridge - which he could have sworn it did not look like that two weeks ago - and returned to the living room (and he tried to make a mental note of the directions they took through the hallways to get there). They resumed their study of kinetic motion but the only motion Lance could focus on was the swaying of the room.

“I think I need to go home,” he said in the middle of Pidge’s explanation.

“Really, Lance? We haven’t studied five min-” She frowned a moment as she looked him over. “You’re… actually _really_ pale. Are you alright?”

“Um… I think… yeah. I think so.” His voice was starting to slur ever so slightly and he had a feeling it would only get worse. “I just need to… to lie down, or something.” 

“You can lie down on the couch or I’ll get you a bed! I don’t think you should be walking home in the state you’re in.”

“No really, I’ll… I should go home.” He stood up and swayed, but Pidge quickly stood up and placed a hand on his shoulder to steady him. 

“At least let me walk you there,” she insisted. 

His house was just a few blocks down from hers so the walk wasn’t long, but they still had to take a few rest stops for Lance to catch his breath and steady his nausea. Mrs. Villanueva kindly greeted them and took Lance in, thanking Pidge for her help (and referring to her as ‘Katie’). Pidge walked back home and wondered what could have overcome her friend. His constitution had gone from perfectly fine to on his deathbed within minutes. She made it a note to check in on him tomorrow if she didn’t hear from him.

* * *

Mama Villanueva put Lance immediately to bed, completely tucking the blankets around him and leaving him with bottles of water, a sleeve of saltines, and a throw-up bowl. He had a feeling that whatever was wrong with him wasn’t some kind of flu or virus, and a dread gained weight in his chest that he’d have to tell the Holts what happened to him in their lab if he ever wanted to get better.

What if he never got better?

What if he was _dying?_

After several runs of overthinking, Lance eventually passed out from mere exhaustion. Not even his worried, rambling brain could keep him from the fatigue that soon overtook his body. He had stressful dreams of things chasing him, as if the mysterious sickness was something he could not run from or escape. When he awoke in the middle of the night, he was fairly sure it was a false awakening and he was still in a dream.

Because he was floating above his bed. 

It wasn’t the weirdest thing that had happened in his dreams but it started to get freaky when he saw his whole body was slightly translucent. And for whatever reason, instead of his sleepwear he was dressed in what he wore yesterday and his clothes were inverted in color. His jacket was now a pale frosted gray, the orange bands around his sleeves now a vibrant blue. His jeans became a light tan while his shirt and shoes darkened into a charcoal gray.

“Of course I’d dream myself as a ghost after worrying about dying,” he muttered to himself as he looked at his hands with a calm fascination. He also knew he was dreaming because the sickness that consumed his body before was magically gone. He knew if he had woken for real, he would have felt like death.

He tried moving to the ground and floated on down with ease, his feet touching the floor without a sound. He started to walk out of his room but then decided to try floating instead because if he was a ghost why bother using the energy to walk? He discovered he could do it without much thought, his feet hovering a few inches from the ground with knees relaxed as if he were making his way through zero gravity.

Lance was about to open his door but his hand phased through it, causing him to let out a startled yelp. He covered his mouth with his hand that wasn't halfway through the door and waited, listening to hear if he woke anyone up. He shook his head, realizing this was a dream and it didn't matter if he woke up his parents or siblings. Although for all he knew, in this dream world there might have been monsters or something equally as terrifying he did not want to awaken.

He returned his focus to his hand in the door. It didn't hurt but he could feel where the doorknob began through his wrist and where the door ended halfway through his fingers like a precise singeing upon his skin. It didn’t burn, exactly, but Lance didn’t want to linger through a solid object for too long.

"This is the weirdest thing…" He experimented by moving his hand in and out through the door through various parts, testing how it felt at different angles. He slowly made his way phasing his whole body through the door, pausing here and there with curiosity. It wasn't long after he passed through the door that a chilling sensation passed up his spine and caused him to let out a squeaky wheeze. Some strange feeling overcame him, urging him to go outside.

Now knowing he could phase through solid objects, he passed through the bathroom in the hall and straight to the outside of his house. He turned towards the street, completely silent and serene in the middle of the night, and saw a figure in the distance. Normally a stranger out in the street at three in the morning was a major red flag but Lance could afford to follow his dangerously unhealthy curiosity when it was only a dream. He might get chased and murdered by a serial killer with an axe, but he could phase through walls now so it might not be nearly as scary (at least that's how he justified it).

Upon hovering closer, he saw that the figure was semi-translucent as well, although the stranger had his feet planted on the ground like a normal person. Perhaps everyone in this particular alternate universe were ghostly. Lance must have spent way too long staring at the stranger because when he spoke it completely startled him.

"What are you doing out here?"

Lance struggled for a moment as his mouth worked but only sputtering came out. "B-bold of you to say that when you're out in the middle of the street in the middle of the night… in _the middle of my dream_ ," he added for emphasis, as if that mattered. "So what are _you_ doing out here?"

"It's not safe out here, you should go back to your home," the stranger said in a kind but cautious tone. He was interesting looking and perhaps that's why Lance was staring so intensely before. The stranger had purple skin with darker stripes curving up his cheeks, his eyes an electric yellow with bright purple irises. Lance had to wonder if he looked just as strange but the color of his skin was its usual warm tone.

"My home is right there," he jabbed a thumb behind him. "So I might as well see what's going on."

"No, really." The stranger almost looked nervous. "You should go."

"Aww come on, do I really look that pathetic?" Lance scoffed, confident that he could handle whatever this dream verse would throw at him. He had played enough video games to improvise and figure out how to survive.

"Considering you no longer have legs, yes."

He stared at him in confusion for a moment, then dared to look down to see his legs were gone, a translucent ghostly tail curling down from his waist instead. "Oh! Wha… what does that mean?" _This dream is turning out weirder by the minute._

"Either you're an emotional wreck or you have no control over your ghost powers. Or both," he answered flatly. "Don't you know you don't need your tail unless you're traveling at high speeds or maneuvering quickly through solid objects?"

Lance lowered his brows. "I- wh?- _No._ I have no idea how to be a ghost."

The stranger looked a hundred percent done. "You _are_ a ghost."

"Yeah, just for right now in this weird dream. I always have weird dreams when I'm sick."

"This is real life. It's not a dream."

"See? That's _exactly_ what someone in my dream would say!"

The stranger rolled his bright eyes. "Fine. Whatever. Die for all I care."

"Aren't we already dead? We're ghosts."

His eyes narrowed, his expression intense. "You… you aren't normally human, are you?"

"Of course I'm 'normally' human," he answered with air quotes. "What kind of a question is that?"

The stranger suddenly looked apprehensive. "You really need to go home. And stay there."

Lance placed his hands on his hips, his face turning into a frustrated pout. "You're not the boss of me."

He turned on him, his face only inches away as his voice tugged an urgency from Lance's chest. "Your kind are rare and there is a hunter out on the loose _looking_ for ghosts like you. Believe me when I say _you do not want to be caught._ If you care at all about your own self-preservation you will run and hide. I can mislead him from your home but only if you promise to stay there."

Lance was silent a moment, his eyes wide as he tried to process the severity of his words, but something stuck out to him more than the imminent danger or the implication that he was no longer human. "Why would you want to help me?"

The other ghost hesitated but his answer felt sincere. "Because we're more similar than you think." His golden eyes moved to the house and back to Lance to indicate he should go back, and with that, he gave him one last look and flew away, out of the streetlight and into the darkness.

"… I guess that's one way for my dream to wake me up." He shrugged and hovered back towards his house, phased through the walls and went back to his room. As soon as he approached the bed, the same chill from earlier traveled up his spine except this time he felt it worse.

He had a feeling that whatever the stranger was running from had arrived.

And whatever it was, it felt like a horribly bad omen.


	2. Smells Like Teen Spirit

When Lance awoke in the morning, he recalled the strange dream with perfect clarity. Usually he could only remember bits and pieces or the general idea of what occurred, but this time he could recall specific details such as the alien feeling of the chill up his spine and the sound of the stranger's voice.

His worst suspicions were confirmed when he got up to brush his teeth and when he leaned up against the sink for support (he was still feeling somewhat sick and exhausted) his hand fell through the porcelain. His stomach knotted up and he felt his heart skip several beats. Part of him didn't want to lift his hand out of the counter because maybe the reality wouldn't exist the longer he kept his arm submerged through a solid object. He shut his eyes tightly, hoping that would do something to return everything to normal, as if he were simply hallucinating, but when his eyes opened his arm was still translucent and when he looked in the mirror he saw his eyes were no longer blue.

Like the stranger in his dream-not-dream, his eyes no longer looked human.

Lance jumped back and nearly shrieked, but covered his mouth with his still solid hand. His mother's words to him as a child replayed in his head like a divine explanation: _There are no monsters in your closet, sweetheart. But there are ghosts, and they are real, vile, dangerous demons, but know that your mom and dad will protect you from any of their devious tricks. Our house is safe._

Ghosts were real and now he was one of them.

He had to get out of here before one of his family members found out and murdered him.

Lance made a decision. If there was anyone who would know what to do, it would be the Holts since they built the crazy machine that (he assumed) was the source of his problems. After a few calming breaths he was able to get himself back to normal, then worked his way to sneaking out his bedroom window to avoid any possible run-ins with his family and ran down the street to the Holt house. His hand returned to solid form after a minute but he had no idea if his eyes were still electric green.

If his eyes went back to normal by the time he arrived at the Holts, he wasn't even sure how to activate the strange ghostly side to him as proof of what happened, or was happening, so he wondered if Pidge would even believe him. She believed in ghosts, right? She was a very scientific individual and his doubts were starting to consume him.

 _Worst case scenario I'll just look like an idiot,_ Lance thought as he hovered his shaking hand over the door for a moment before knocking. _But I do that on a daily basis - so today won't be any different._

Pidge answered the door and raised her brows. "Lance? What are you- are you feeling better?"

"Umm…. yes and no? I need to ask you something. Well, first I need to tell you something."

She gestured for him to come inside and walked her way over to the couch. "Well, at least you're looking a lot better than last night."

"Oh I am? That's… good? I guess?" He closed the door and awkwardly sidestepped into the living room. Pidge narrowed her eyes, her mouth opening as she was about to question his odd behavior but before she could get a word out of him her dog came running into the room like a speeding comet, growling at Lance's feet as if he were an intruding stranger. His eyes widened as he looked down at the dog and started to panic. "Bae Bae? It's me, Lancey Lance!" He held up his hands defensively when her growls intensified. "I feed you homemade non-garlic knots from my mom, come on we're friends!!"

"Bae Bae? What's gotten into you?" She started towards her dog to calm her down but Bae Bae started jumping and barking at Lance. He let out a startled yelp and held up his arms to his chest defensively. Pidge's voice cut through the noise like a dagger. " _Bae Bae!_ "

Lance tried inching closer to the door, planning to bolt if necessary but he didn't even have time to think about doing such when Bae Bae finally lunged for his leg and he closed his eyes and shrieked.

The room became dead silent and Lance felt no pain reach his leg. Opening his eyes, he looked down to see his semi-translucent body and then looked up to see Pidge staring at him, aghast. Bae Bae let out the occasional little growl but otherwise took interest in sniffing him as she phased through his legs. He let out a long, drawn-out sigh and placed his hands on his hips.

"Huh, I have legs this time," he observed nonchalantly as he looked down at himself. "Well, I guess the cat's out of the bag."

"Yeah the whole freaking _clowder_ is out of the sack!" she scoffed indignantly.

"Clowder?"

"Group of cats," she said dismissively before walking up to him and poking her finger through his chest, her curious eyes widening as she made incomprehensible noises. "Wha- how?? _You're a ghost??_ You didn't seem too shocked by all this so I'm guessing my dog didn't somehow accidentally send you prematurely to the realm of the dead?"

"Uhh no… it first happened last night, and I have _no idea_ how it happened." He cleared his throat awkwardly as he watched her continually stab a finger through the cavity of his chest, feeling an odd mixture of warmth and disturbance. "Well, I have like… sixty-seven percent of an idea, but it's a crazy idea."

"I think at this point, 'crazy' is the only way to explain this." She looked up at him, fully taking in the snow white hair and unnaturally green eyes. Her amber gaze lingered there, taking in the distinct electric green color of his irises and lack of pupils. It gave him an otherworldly aura and staring too long was causing shivers to travel down her spine. It made sense for his eyes to start creeping her out - he was a ghost after all. She sucked in her purple-tinted lips as the wheels turned in her mind. "Follow me."

She turned on her heel and started heading down one of the hallways and Lance quickly followed. "Hey, what about your parents or Matt??"

"I'm the only one here right now, you'll be fine."

Bae Bae followed at his heels and Lance kept having a mini heart attack that he was going to kick the dog but he had to remember his legs were intangible. When he reached the room Pidge led him to, he let out a gasp and pointed dramatically to the fridge-not-fridge.

"This is! This is, well…"

Pidge's brows lowered, her eyes widening. "Wait, you _know_ this place?"

"Umm… so here's where my sixty-seven percent of a theory comes into play."

"Oh great."

He walked over to the contraption with the giant red lever. "So _this_ is what I thought was some kind of fridge at first, right? And then-"

"You thought a _generator_ was a _fridge?!?_ "

"Shoosh, minor detail, _Pidge._ " He gave her a face and then turned towards the double doors. "I pulled the red handle but it didn't open anything, and in fact it turned which I thought was weird, so I thought maybe _this_ was a fridge, or even a pantry, or… something."

"You turned on the generator and then walked into the alternate dimension portal?? _Without a safety suit?!?_ " Pidge’s voice broke a few octaves. 

"Into a _what_ now??" Lance tried to open the doors but his hands kept phasing through it. He made a pathetic groan in frustration.

"Step aside," Pidge said as she walked up to the handles but she just ended up stepping inside him. "Ohhhhkay, this is _weird._ You're _cold_."

"Oh really?" he asked excitedly with raised eyebrows as if she had complimented him, his grin widening. "Maybe that's why people get _chills_ whenever there's a ghost around?"

She cracked a smile before opening the doors and stepping inside. "You're such a dork. You must be handling this pretty well if you can make jokes like that."

He laughed nervously as he followed her in. "Quite the opposite actually… but you said this was an alternate dimension portal or something?? What does that even _mean?"_

She held her chin with her hand as she thought, her eyes narrowed in concentration. "This is a project my parents kind of gave up on a while back. Their theory is that there's an alternate dimension that lies parallel to our own and it is where ghosts live and originate. But there's cracks where the barrier is thin between dimensions and that is how ghosts are able to make it into ours. This machine was supposed to bend the barrier between dimensions, allowing us access to the ghost realm."

"So you think I went to the ghost realm? And came back a ghost? But I can still turn human, so I'm confused."

"As am I… I don't think the machine actually works. But it may have bended the barrier enough to expose you to something." She headed back out of the machine and Lance followed her over to the opposite corner of the lab where she opened up a drawer full of glass canisters. She pulled one out and lifted it to show him the glowing vibrant green substance. "I'm thinking you were exposed to this."

"Wha- What is that?"

"Ectoplasm." She set the container back and shut the drawer. "Your eyes are the only thing in the world I've seen that match the color of this stuff, so I'm thinking the machine somehow got ectoplasm into your system and changed you."

Lance made a sound of distress. "Do you think we can fix it??" As if on cue, he changed back into his normal form.

"It looks like you just did," she said with a pointed finger.

He looked down at himself and threw a hand to his chest to confirm he was solid and let out a sigh. "I mean like a permanent fix! I can't control changing back and forth. I'm going to sneeze at the dinner table and accidentally change and my whole family will die from sheer terror."

Pidge started to rummage through some drawers. "Yeaaaah isn't your family incredibly superstitious in regards to anything paranormal?"

Bae Bae started letting out small barks at Lance's feet. " _Terribly so."_ He bent over and let the dog sniff his hand and although reluctant, she allowed him to pet her. "If they found out, they'd probably try to exorcise me and it'd probably kill me since this seems to be… not a temporary thing."

Pidge could detect the sadness in his voice, causing her to still. After a moment of silence and coming to a decision, she assembled her tools and turned to face him. "Give me your arm."

He stood up to see Pidge wearing lab gloves and holding a tourniquet. His eyes flicked over to the needle and syringe on the table behind her. "Wait, what are you-"

She grabbed his right arm and pulled up his sleeve, wrapping the tourniquet around his bicep. "I want to run some tests on your blood, it may give us some answers."

" _Waitwaitwaitwait-"_

The needle was about to make contact with his skin when suddenly he became a ghost and the needle passed straight through his arm, Pidge's grip clenching into a fist since she no longer had anything solid to hold on to. "LAAANCE!"

"You can't just SPRING a needle on me!"

" _Yes I can_ because I knew you'd react this way." She pouted her dark lips at him and turned towards a different drawer, pulling out a black kitchen knife. "But since you're a ghost, I might as well collect _this_ sample."

"WHAT are you going to do with THAT?"

"If you _cooperate_ , I'm just going to give you a papercut." She glared at him, and seeing her do such with a giant knife in hand certainly terrified him. "If you don't, it'll be a much bigger cut."

"Pffft but you can't cut me with thaaaaaOOOOW!" She softly took the edge of the knife against his exposed forearm and it caused a small cut to form upon his skin. Lance naturally held the wound with his other hand and pulled it to his chest but Pidge was already holding out a sample cup.

"Hold your arm out, doofus!"

At this point Lance didn't want to argue with her and instead held his arm out with his palm up so the backside of his forearm could drip down to where Pidge held the container. When Lance saw that his 'blood' was vibrant green he let out a disturbed gasp. "That's - that's _inside me???_ "

"It's ghost blood, Lance," she replied casually.

He stared at his arm as if it were no longer his own. "I don't know how to feel about this."

She capped the sample cup with a lid and stood up. "It's a lot to process, huh?" She looked up at him, her expression sympathetic. "As soon as you're human again I'll need a blood sample, but once I have samples of both I'm going to see what I can find. I'm going to see if there's anything I can do to reverse this and if not… I think we need to consider telling my parents about this."

"You'd… keep this a secret even from your parents? Why?"

She frowned and let out an exhale. "I… I honestly don't know how my parents will react to the news. I don't want you to get hurt. Ghosts are technically more akin to what we refer to as demons - they're not spirits of the dead." She worried the bottom of her wine-colored lips. "I don't know if they'll think you've been corrupted or something... ghosts are not only a nuisance but they're considered evil. My parents might try imprisoning you if they don't attempt to destroy you first."

"Oh wow... really??" If Lance could get any more pale as a ghost, he did. He held the wound on his arm and felt sick as the ice cold blood oozed between his fingers. "I thought ghosts were just the spirits of the vengeful dead."

"Myth," she said with a wave of her hand. "People only think that because most ghosts look quite human in appearance - as you know - and of course in the event of seeing a ghost people are freaked out and the adrenaline causes them to come up with a logical explanation and so they see the face of a relative or long lost lover or something when that's not who the ghost actually is."

"This is the weirdest piece of information I've ever received." His brows lowered even more. "That makes more sense though why my family is so adamant about hating ghosts if they're all actually… evil demons instead of just dead people."

She took a moment to really look Lance over and saw how distressed he appeared. His shoulders sagged and brows dug into his eyes. Although he hid it well she could see the occasional involuntary twitch of his hands, which meant they were shaking. On top of freaking out about everything that had happened and worrying about the state of his well-being, Lance was scared to go home.

"Do you want to play some video games?"

"…wha? Pidge, I've just told you - or rather shown you - I'm a ghost, and you want to play video games?"

"Standing here and panicking about it even more isn't going to get us anywhere. You need a distraction and I need to think. So I think some down time together doing something normal would be good for both our nerves."

"Oh." He wrung his hands as he thought about her proposal from her perspective. "That's… that's actually probably a really good idea. Yeah, let's play some games."

She gave him an encouraging smile. "Let's see who can kill more robots."

* * *

"Ok, you bought milkshakes and now you're giving me… is this _red velvet cake?_ My favorite??" Lance took a bite of the slice of cake Pidge practically shoved into his hands and let out a hum of pleasure. "You know my birthday isn't for nine months."

"I'm terrible at my bedside manner," she began as she pulled out her laptop and set it on the counter, facing the screen towards him. "So I figured this would help."

" _Bedside manner… wait_ , am I _dying??"_

"Don't be so melodramatic. If you were dying do you really think I'd be feeding you red velvet cake when the more obvious choice would be _death by chocolate?_ "

"Oh yeah, right." He playfully rolled his eyes. "Obvious."

"Do you want me to start with the not so bad news or the really bad news?"

"Ease it to me gently, I guess," Lance said before shoving a large bite of cake into his mouth.

Pidge made some clicks on her laptop to show him various graphs and excel sheets, all waves of information he didn't know how to understand. "The green blood you have when you're in ghost form seems to be perfectly stable, 100% ghost blood. So you're not some anomaly, you're actually a ghost in that form."

"Mmmhmm," he mumbled between bites.

"Your human blood, however..." She clicked over to a different screen that showed colorful bars that indicated various levels of his genetic makeup. "It's... whatever got into your system altered your very DNA. It was a genetic mutation of sorts."

"Which means?"

"You're... it's not as simple as you're a ghost when you're a ghost and human when you're human, you're... you're no longer human, Lance. And there's no way for me to fix it." She lifted her eyes to see he was staring blankly at the screen, his body language also unreadable as he was as still as a statue. "I'd have to somehow change your DNA and if modern science knew how to do that there wouldn't be any cancer."

She jumped at the shattering of Lance's plate. He had reverted to his ghost form and the plate of cake fell through his now intangible hands to lie in a mess on the ground. He looked down through his upturned palms and let out a despondent sigh. Before Pidge could get up to stand by him he already had his face buried in his hands.

"I... I know, I'm a mess." He struggled to speak and the strain in his voice broke her heart. "I'm sorry."

"Lance, why are you-" She shook her head, realizing that arguing over unnecessary apologies wasn't going to help the situation. She stood next to him, wanting to place a hand on his shoulder but it phased right through, so she awkwardly moved it back to her side. "I'm sorry... I thought I could help but... turns out I don't know what I'm doing."

"You know a lot more than me, that's for sure," he sniffled.

"Hey, we're going to figure something out, okay? Even if this is permanent it doesn't have to be horrible. We can make it somehow bearable." 

Suddenly Lance was no longer semi-transparent, his body looked solid even though his hair and inverted jacket told her he was still ghost. She tried placing her hand on his shoulder again to find that she could.

Lance was startled by the contact as well, lifting his head to turn teary eyes to look at her, his breath stilling. "I... I'm solid." He looked down at his inverted clothes then back to her. "My hair's still white and my eyes still green, right?"

"Yeah... you're somehow solid as a ghost?" Pidge frowned. "I don't understand... oof!!"

Lance had grabbed her into a tight hug, lifting her feet off the ground. "Who cares? I have a feeling we won't ever fully understand any of this, but... _thank you,_ Pidge."

"You are more than welcome," she responded strenuously as he squeezed her ribs. She felt an odd warmth spread within her chest despite the fact that he was cold to the touch, her arms wrapping around his shoulder blades and holding him tight. "This is all my fault, after all..."

" _What?"_ He set her back down on the ground but kept his hands on her shoulders. " _I'm_ the one who accidentally turned on a generator and walked into an alternate dimensional portal _without a safety suit_ and screwed myself over. You had nothing to do with this."

"I should have known you'd get lost in my house! I don't... think about these kinds of things because I've grown up in this kind of craziness my whole life, so it's normal for me. Hunk doesn't get as lost as you but his curiosity is worse than yours so I'm surprised it's not him who has done this madness first. I gotta hand it to you though, that was a string of crazy coincidences that led up to all of this happening."

"Funny you should say 'string of crazy coincidences' because I wanted string cheese at the time. And 'crazy' is putting it lightly, I think. Ooooh-" He released her and picked up the remnants of his cake on the ground. "I wonder if I can eat when I'm like this." He was about to take a bite of cake that hadn't touched the ground when both of them froze at the sound of an opening door further within the house. Lance's vibrant green eyes found Pidge's widened ambers.

"My parents are home," she said as if it were a death sentence. " _My parents are home!!"_

Lance started stammering in a panic. "What do I-? Should I hide? Try phasing through the wall?"

"Here." She grabbed his hoodie and secured it over his head, effectively hiding his white hair. "Let's just hope that they don't notice the coloring of your clothes is off. Umm..." She looked at his eyes and bit her lip. His eyebrows and eyelashes were still dark brown and if his eyes were just green it might go unnoticed but his irises were vibrantly glowing and they were an unnatural hue. There was no way her parents wouldn't notice such an anomaly. "Here, sit down and pretend you're taking a nap." 

She practically forced him down into the chair after grabbing the plate of cake from him and kicking the broken pieces under the desk. He threw a leg up onto the desk and crossed his arms, tilting his head against his shoulder in a convincing Lance-like napping position. She slumped into her chair and pulled her computer onto her lap just in time before her mother walked into the room.

"Oh Katie, are you-"

Pidge threw up a finger to her lips and jabbed a finger towards Lance. "He was so tired he passed out, I'd hate to wake him up," she whispered.

Colleen gave a sympathetic nod before grabbing the door handle and whispering back, "We brought you home dinner. I'll tell dad to stick it in the fridge for you."

She mouthed a “thank you” before Colleen quietly closed the door behind her. She let out a slow exhale and saw Lance cracked open one vibrant eye. "That worked better than I thought it would," she admitted.

"I wonder what they brought you for dinner," he said with a grin.

"Really? That's what's on your mind?"

"Hey, I'm hungry.” He sat up and returned to eating his cake, letting out a thoughtful hum. "Eating still... _feels_ normal. So I guess I can eat like this?"

"You don't _have_ to eat though..." Pidge mused. "Not as a ghost, at least. Although by the time you revert back to normal your hunger may have accumulated for the time you were ghost." Her brows knitted together. "You know, with you being half-human half-ghost, I actually have no idea how _anything_ would work with you. This is all theory and speculation that I'm pulling out of thin air."

"It's better speculation than I could come up with." Lance finished the last of the edible parts of his cake and held out his hands, palms up as he shrugged. "I think everything is going to be a game of cat and mouse at this point."

Pidge scrunched up her face. "I think you mean 'trial and error'? Unless there are ghosts chasing you I don't know about."

"Oh, yeah. You're right. I meant trial and error." Suddenly he became semi-translucent and intangible once more, but his legs also reverted into a ghost tail. He let out a loud sigh of frustration. "I have absolutely no control over any of this."

Pidge was already there, poking a finger through his stomach. "But where does your physical _body go???_ "

He looked down at her curiosity with mild irritation. "You know, Pidge, you don't need a scientific explanation for everything in this universe."

"No, but everything in this universe _does_ have a scientific explanation. Even if we don't understand it yet."

His expression softened and a temporary moment of calm washed over him. Despite the insanity of everything that happened he watched Pidge's pensive face as she continued to poke his torso and realized she would take good care of him. Pidge was stubborn and hardworking and probably wouldn't sleep until she discovered some kind of solution for him. He had nothing to worry about so long as she was by his side. "Can't you just write it off as 'magic' like everyone else?"

"I refuse." She looked up at him, her eyes almost angry. "It took decades for people to accept the concept of electricity because they thought it was witchcraft. They simply didn't understand the science behind it, and that's all that magic is - science we don't understand yet."

Lance frowned. "Alright, fine. But can you please stop poking me? I have no control over this and I don't want to think about what would happen if I turned solid while your finger is between my ribs."

Pidge had a momentary look of horror before she retrieved her hand and stood up straight. "I certainly don't want to think about that either."

* * *

Ever since Pidge found out Lance's secret he practically lived at the Holt house. With the convenient excuse of a "major school project" it was easy to slip away from his family and keep his mom updated with texts ("The Holts invited me for dinner, I'd hate to say no," "We're making a lot of progress and Pidge is teaching me tons!," "We're almost done with this section and then I'll be home!") since she was so enthusiastic about him progressing in his studies. 

It became more difficult to come up with such a cover for Hunk, who wanted to join their "study sessions" (which, they actually did study half the time, when Pidge wasn’t studying Lance). After a catastrophic night when Pidge had to spontaneously distract Hunk with talk of quantum theory while Lance tried to make his suddenly intangible arm solid again, Lance collapsed on the couch with a loud sigh as soon as their friend left for the night.

"We should probably just tell him, Pidge."

She groaned dramatically. "I don't _want_ you to tell him."

Lance raised an eyebrow. "What? Why?"

"Think about it, Lance." She side-eyed him. "Hunk is scared of ghosts."

"OOOOOH you're _right!!_ I totally forgot about that." He held his chin with his hand in a thinking position. "Cheese. He's gotta found out _eventually_ , considering he's around us all the time and he's my best friend." Lance scrunched up his face. "Would he even want to stay friends after he finds out what I am?!"

Pidge resisted rolling her eyes. "Of course he will, Lance. We just gotta... break it to him gently, I guess. Which reminds me, I need to ask Matt something," she announced before departing out of the room and down the hall. She was working on a project that would help Lance but occasionally she needed a second input or an explanation on something. It was easy to mask it as some kind of research project for school. Matt had no idea.

Pidge was taking a long time and Lance was suddenly getting anxious. Thinking about Hunk finding out his secret only made him dread going home. If he couldn't control his arm from going part ghost earlier, who was to say some slip up wouldn't happen in his house full of superstitious ghost haters? He wanted to ask Pidge if he could crash on her couch again. It seemed the safer option.

He wandered down the hallway and was glad he had voices to follow otherwise he might have gotten lost (and he and Pidge knew that was catastrophic). As he drew nearer he could hear both of them talking about something hypothetical and planes of existence. He liked to hear Pidge talk science but most of the time he had no idea what she was talking about. When he approached them, Matt suddenly stopped talking but he took that as an invitation to turn to Pidge and speak.

"Hey Pidge, I was wondering-"

Lance was interrupted when Matt started screaming. He turned his head just in time to see Matt's fist reach his face but it phased right through his ghostly form.

And he hit Pidge instead.

Pidge let out a cry and crumpled to the ground, clutching the top of her head. Matt's face was a mix of shock and confusion as he moved his eyes between his sister and Lance. Caught up in the heat of the moment, Lance instinctively tried punching Matt to get back at him for hurting Pidge but his fist phased through the older sibling's head. Lance deadpanned, keeping his arm through Matt's face.

"See, this is _exactly_ why I can't go home."

Matt moved out of Lance's arm and rubbed at one of his temples, his head suddenly getting a brain-freeze. "Wha... what exactly is going on here?"

"Gee Matt, you look like you've seen a ghost."

"Is... is that not what I'm seeing??"

Lance shrugged. "Yeah, I just felt like saying that."

"Well," Pidge muttered as she slowly stood up, "That certainly did not go how I planned. Lance, put your hand right here." She pointed to the spot on her head where Matt had punched her. When he did so, she let out a small sigh of relief at the coldness of his touch. It was like sticking an ice pack on her bruise. "Alright, so, long story short, Lance accidentally turned on the reality portal while he was still in it-"

"He did _what??!_ Please tell me he at least had a safety suit on..." Matt said.

Pidge chuckled maniacally. "He did _not_."

"The audacity!"

"I know!"

"Okay guys," Lance muttered impatiently, "I get it, safety first."

"And somehow it turned him into a... half-human half-ghost hybrid. He can switch back and forth. I ran blood work and it doesn't seem to be killing him either. He's just... this is how he is now."

"That explains all your questions about planes of existence and theoretical intangibility," Matt observed. He stared at Lance a moment as he tried to soak it all in and then looked over at his sister (through Lance) with a concerned expression. "I'm sorry about the... yeah. Is your head alright?"

"It will be." She gave him a devilish smirk. "But I won't say no to a milkshake as a proper apology."

"Fair." Matt looked at Lance's unnerving green eyes. "You probably deserve one too. Can you even drink a milkshake?"

"YES I can still drink milkshakes!" Lance whined. "When I'm solid, at least."

"Okay, I'm going on a milkshake run but when I get back you two are telling me _everything._ "

* * *

Lance stayed over late at the Holt’s house (again) explaining everything to Matt and he had _so_ many questions. Lance tried his best to be patient but there came a point where he had to run home before one of his parents skinned him alive. It was nearly midnight and while he had high hopes he could sneak past everyone, he knew it was a suicide mission. 

"Lance honey, you look like you've just seen a ghost!" his mother interjected, preventing him from slipping past the kitchen without being noticed.

"Yeah, I looked in the mirror," he grumbled, trying to leave.

"You are not nearly pale enough to make that kind of self-deprecating joke, dear."

Lance sighed, glad that his mother wasn't suspicious despite the fact she could hear him (and he'd have to remember she had crazy good hearing) but also felt defeated as he backtracked his way to the counter and sat on one of the stools.

"What's troubling you? You're not studying too hard, are you? You're always over at the Holts these days…"

"I'm… I'm just tired, I think." He knew the exact reason he looked so dead was from the stress of keeping his double life a secret from his family, trying to keep his powers in control, and fighting hostile ghosts on a daily basis. Not to mention _homework._ "I have a big test coming up in one of my classes." It was true and he was lowkey freaking out about it, but he couldn't help the sinking feeling in his stomach at having to lie to his mother.

"You can always ask Veronica to help you study too. She'd be happy to help." She let out a small pleasant hum. "Although I know how fond you are of Katie-"

"Yeah she's a great _friend,_ mom!" he cut in nervously with a laugh. "I don't know what I would do without her. But I'm fine, really. I think I'm just going to hit the sheets early tonight." He got up from the stool and started to leave.

"You sure you don't need anything? I can make you some _hot chooocolate_ ~" she chimed with an eyebrow wiggle.

Lance couldn't help the warm smile that found place upon his lips. "Actually, that sounds delightful." 


	3. No Ghost of Any Common Sense

"Theoretically speaking, what could a half-ghost person do during a ghost attack on the school?" Lance whispered fervently to Pidge as they both hid beneath a desk. The Garrison - an advanced post-high school military institution - was overrun with spectral rodents of unusual size, students and professors alike running around screaming. From what Lance could tell, the rats weren't actually harming anyone but they were certainly destroying school property.

"I don't know, maybe you could start by actually _turning into a ghost_?" Pidge hissed.

"Oh. Yeah, smart." He stood out from under the desk and valiantly placed his hands on his hips and started to brazenly announce, "I'm going gho-AH!"

Pidge grabbed him by the shirt and yanked him back under the desk. "Idiot! You don't announce your secret identity to the whole freakin' school!!"

"I was trying to intimidate the ghosts!"

"You don't want them to know you're half human! They could use that to their advantage."

"Oh." Lance frowned in thought. "I thought that would be more an advantage for me."

She shook her head. "I don't actually know, like we said this is a lot of trial and error."

"Or cat and mouse." He wiggled his eyebrows.

"Yes yes, now go chase the mice you stupid cat."

"Alright." He narrowed his eyes dramatically at her and whispered, "I'm going ghost."

As he switched into his ghost form, Pidge rolled her eyes. "You don't have to announce it every time you do it."

"I uhhh…. actually haven't figured out how to do it without saying it yet." He turned intangible and fell through the floor to slip away as Pidge facepalmed. She could hear Lance was doing something since a chorus of shrieks erupted from the ghost rats. But it wasn't long until she could hear a distinct shrieking that belonged to a certain Cuban boy.

She let out a groan of annoyance. "What am I going to do with you."

The generally destructive but non-harmful mice suddenly turned violent as soon as Lance made an appearance, as if they wanted to only pester humans but as soon as another ghost showed up all bets were off. Although they were relatively weak, Lance had a hard time holding them all off by himself. Between constantly blasting one with ectoplasm from his hands and turning intangible to avoid one launching for his face, he was starting to get exhausted.

"I wonder if the cafeteria has enough string cheese to lure you guys out…" he mused idly between rats trying to tackle him. When Lance was distracted by an explosion that rattled the school, a rat leapt up and knocked him to the ground with a wheeze. He kicked the rat off him and resumed his hovering position. He blinked a few times to change his vision so he could see through walls and found the source of the explosion was in one of the chemistry classrooms. Fire began to spread about the labs and he knew that if he didn't do something more explosions would occur from all the chemicals and generators.

He swore when he saw Pidge running straight towards it.

Once he sped through enough walls to reach the chemistry lab where the fires raged and ceiling sprinklers rained down, he remained ghost but turned himself solid and ran over to Pidge. She was at a computer on a podium, her eyes never leaving the screen despite his presence.

"Pidge, what are you doing?? You need to get out of here!"

"I'm trying to activate the shields for the chemistry labs. It'll contain the fire and any explosions. But it's not _working._ " He now noticed how hard her fingers were pressing the keys, a small observation of her fear slipping out from her otherwise calm demeanor. "There's gotta be something wrong with the circuit board, possibly the wires."

Lance looked with his x-ray vision to see the wires that ran through the walls like colorful veins. "From what I can tell the wires all look fine? I don't see any obvious breaks." It seemed the ghost rats weren't following him either, as they continued to run around the school aimlessly wreaking havoc. He spun back to face her with angry green eyes. "That aside, you still need to get out of here, Pidge! It's dangerous!"

"If we don't do something to stop the fires the whole school will explode and then we'll all be dead!" She frowned. "Well, except you."

" _That's_ comforting," he scoffed. Before Lance could say anything more, another explosion rattled the lab, causing Pidge to lose her footing and fall to the ground and the long, hanging LED lights to snap free of their suspension. Lance only had a second to rush over to Pidge and shield her before one could crash down on top of her. It collided with Lance's back, eliciting a pained cry as the other lights shattered around them. The lab was now shrouded in darkness save for the faint light of the fire and the eerie glow of Lance's entire body, which slowly flickered like a dying lightbulb as he reverted back to his human form.

Pidge blinked several times to clear her head after hitting the ground and saw Lance over her with his hands planted on either side of her face, his familiar brown hair and blue eyes returned, his expression pained.

"Lance?"

It took him too long to respond. "…yeah?"

"Are you okay?! How come you're no longer ghost?"

He looked at both his arms as if he was just coming to this realization. "I'm… not sure," he answered weakly to both questions.

Pidge squirmed out from under him and swore when she saw the cause of his pain. His back had braced the fall of the light but a large piece of glass stuck between his shoulder blades gleamed ominously in the firelight. "Quick, Lance, I have an idea. Go ghost and make yourself intangible." Her voice wavered slightly but he was too weak to notice it. She figured if he went intangible the glass would simply pass through his body without causing any further harm.

"Oh…kay? I'm going… going…" His arms were shaking, his breaths sounding more like gasps for air. "Gone," he announced before collapsing face-first into the ground.

"Oh no…" When her concern was echoed she whipped her head to the door and saw Hunk running towards them.

"Hunk!? What are you doing here?" she asked as he knelt down on the opposite side of Lance, careful not to kneel on any glass.

"I saw you running towards the explosions and so I ran after you… but got interrupted by mice quite a few times." He shuddered, the memory still unpleasantly fresh. "And then I heard Lance screaming and I came in and saw that… he's… he's…"

Pidge let out a sigh. "Yeah… we'll tell you all about it later."

"What? Shouldn't we take care of this _now??"_

"OH." Her eyes widened a bit when she realized Hunk was only referring to the glass sticking out of Lance. "Yes, of course. Normally I would say it's bad practice to move someone when they're injured, but we're not safe here. I need you to help me carry him out."

Hunk slowly lifted Lance by hooking his arms under and around his shoulders but let out a gasp before Pidge could pick him up by the ankles. "Uhhh Lance has green stuff coming out of his mouth?? I'm no medical professional by any means but isn't that bad? _Did a ghost attack him?!!"_

"Hunk, calm down," she said despite the pounding in her heart. Lance had to be incredibly injured if he was bleeding ghost blood in his human form. "Lance is going to be okay. We need to get him out first."

He nodded and swallowed hard. "Right."

Together they slowly moved him and set him down in the hallway a safe distance from the burning classrooms, but as soon as Pidge and Hunk tried to carefully pry the glass from Lance's back he twitched awake with a pained groan. Not realizing he had been moved, he flickered back into ghost form and slowly hovered into an upright position midair, only to elicit a shriek from Hunk which caused Lance to start screeching as well.

Before Lance could try to explain himself to his best friend, a ghost rat ran up behind Hunk so Lance aimed his palm to attack. Instead of his usual bright green rays of ectoplasm, streams of frosted blue shot from his hand, creating icicles that branched upwards from the ground, encasing the rodent in a chunk of ice.

The three of them stared silently at the immobile rat for a moment until Lance spoke. "Well that's new." He turned his head to face Hunk. "By the way, I'm a ghost now."

 _"By the way I'm a ghost now,"_ Hunk mocked incredulously, "You can't just _by the way_ something like THAT!"

"By the way you still have glass in your back," Pidge warned. "Can you try turning intangible? It's either that or we yank it out." Her brows creased as she saw the mess of vibrant green blood on the back of his jacket.

Lance attempted to crane his neck over his shoulder to examine but quickly stopped with a wince. He let out a slow exhale and turned himself intangible, blinking a few times in confusion when he heard a lack of glass shattering on the floor beneath him. "It's still in me, isn't it?"

Pidge drew closer to him to examine with a light touch of her finger. It passed straight through the glass. "You've turned it intangible too. Perhaps you can turn other things intangible if you're touching them? But since it's inside you you're probably unconsciously making it that way." She let out a growl of distress. "I'm worried that if you try to focus on making the glass solid again, you might pull some of yourself with it."

Lance stiffened. "You mean like…. Parts of my muscles and stuff???"

"Can someone _please_ explain to me what's going on?" Hunk asked impatiently. "Why is Lance a ghost?"

"It's a _long_ story," Pidge and Lance answered simultaneously. Another explosion caused Pidge and Hunk to lose their footing and although the shaking was more violent this time, there was nothing to fall or break. The fires had grown in the classrooms, the angry flames starting to spill out into the dimly lit hallway.

"Well, I have ice powers now," Lance announced flatly. "So let me take care of the fires real quick." He was about to speed off when Pidge grabbed for his wrist. Even though her hand passed through him, the motion caused Lance to pause.

"We have to get that out of you first," she decided.

"Won't that just make me bleed more? Isn't it better to keep things in until a doctor can take it out?"

"You're bleeding green, Lance," Hunk pitched in. "Even when you were… normal. No doctor is going to heal you without wanting to lock you up in some secret government sector cell and experiment on you with sharp instruments afterwards."

He went even more rigid, his form turning solid. "… _Cheese."_

_I can get it out for you._

"Wha??" Lance turned around to see another smaller ghost rat daintily poised next to its frozen friend with expectant eyes. "Did you just talk?"

_Yeah? All ghosts can talk, silly._

He shook his head. "Of course they can," he said sarcastically as if he were reprimanding himself for not realizing it sooner. "How can you help?"

"Ohhhhkaaaaaay," Hunk wheezed, "Now you speak rat? Ghost rat? Rat ghost?"

"What, you guys can't…? Oh." Lance turned his head back to the rat, which looked more like a mouse when he thought about it, despite its blue color. "You're talking to me telepathically, aren't you?"

The mouse nodded _. Only fellow ghosts can understand me_. It floated up over to Lance and swiveled around to look at the glass in his back _. Ooooh this is going to hurt. Hold still._

"What exactly are you going to-GYAAAH!"

The mouse passed intangible paws through his shoulder blades and carefully pried the glass out. It fell to the floor with a crack, a few shards scattering on the tile floor. Lance let out an exasperated wheeze, swallowing hard as he felt the tangy bile of his ghostly blood trying to come up his throat.

"I think I'm going to be sick."

"Well wait until after you put out the fires!" Pidge retorted. "The backup generator is down there and bound to explode at any moment!"

 _Tell her to follow me, I can help her activate the shields,_ the mouse said.

"Uhh, Pidge? Follow the mouse. It wants to help you with the shields," he explained. The blue mouse hopped from his shoulders and sped down the hallway in the direction opposite the fires, pausing at the end to wait for her to follow. "Hunk, go with her."

"Can't I help you and find a fire extinguisher or something?" he asked. "What if you go back to being normal again?"

Lance hadn't thought of that but pushed the omen away. "I'll be quick. The shields are just a backup in case I'm not able to get them all in time." He leaned in closer to his friend, his vibrant green irises making his request all the more intimidating. "Please Hunk, make sure no harm comes to her."

"Okay." He gave a serious nod before following after Pidge and the mouse, Lance watching them until they rounded the corner out of sight. He inhaled deeply, feeling some of the tension leaving his body, and sped towards the destruction that lie ahead.

"Well… here goes nothing."

* * *

The generator actually exploded, scaring the ghosts away and injuring Lance further, but with the help of lots of charades the blue mouse was able to instruct Pidge and get the shields up so only the east wing of the school was ruined. Considering that he was somehow still alive and Pidge was only moderately scraped up and Hunk was only somewhat mentally disturbed at his ghostly reveal, Lance figured it could have gone a lot worse.

His back would currently disagree.

"We need to tell your parents," Lance said softly. His expression was hard, the exhaustion showing in his eyes. Pidge and Hunk had quietly rushed him to the Holt house to avoid the paramedics that swarmed the aftermath of the rats at the school. Hunk ran back to the Garrison to cover for them if the need arose and Lance and Pidge sat on the couch contemplating what to do about his injury.

"Are... are you sure?" She remembered Hunk describing it vividly to Lance only an hour ago how the doctors would lock him away and experiment on him and now he was willingly offering to tell his secret to her scientist parents. The uncertainty of how her parents would react caused her stomach to turn.

He was silent a moment before slowly nodding, the movement looking like some kind of commitment to his own death. "I... what happened at school was terrible. I had no control over my abilities and I knew that if I slipped up just a little bit more - I'd probably be dead. Like dead dead. Or worse... you could have died. Or Hunk. Or one of the teachers. Or you know... everyone."

Pidge looked at him with sympathetic eyes, her lips twisting into a pressed frown. "You're doing the best you can, Lance." Her words weren't empty encouragement but they rang sincere. She saw how strong he was when so much was thrust against him and yet he kept wanting to be better and work harder. A part of her admired his resolve and it hurt her to see him in such low spirits, convinced that every failure was due to some personal flaw. "There's only so much you can do, and so far you've done a _lot_."

"Yeah but it's not enough. _I'm_ not enough. We need your parents' help."

Realizing her words had yet to get through to him at this point, she simply nodded. "Okay. We'll tell my parents." She stood up. "Come on, they're in the study."

"Wait, right NOW??!"

"You wanted to tell them right? Might as well get it done and over with."

"I was thinking like... this weekend. You know, some time to prepare and mentally psyche myself for it."

Pidge deadpanned. "Knowing you, the longer we wait, the more you'll overthink it and end up backing out of it entirely."

Lance opened his mouth with a finger lifted to argue, but he ended up pulsing his finger towards her knowingly. "You are _so_ right. Let's do this now."

* * *

Pidge wasn't sure what kind of reaction she was expecting from her parents. Her mind played several vastly different scenarios, from them being struck with scientific horror, to immediately latching him to a table to dissect him, to bursting with a flurry of giddy questions, to locking him away and sending him to some secret sector of the government, or even taking it as some kind of joke. She wasn't quite prepared for their perturbed silence.

After a long lack of response, Pidge and Lance taking turns continuing to explain the events of how it all happened in hopes that one of them would eventually say something, Colleen finally spoke up.

"You went into the alternate dimension portal?"

"By accident," Lance added as if he needed that correction.

"... _Without a safety suit???_ "

Lance threw his head back and sighed dramatically. "I get it I get it! Safety first. Lesson learned. In the most _drastic_ way possible."

"And you don't feel any pain because of this new condition?" Sam inquired, his brows set low.

"No... well... half the reason we decided to come clean and tell you was because I kind of am in pain... but normally I'm not. A-and it's not because of some change in my condition or something like that, it's because I got injured as a ghost and..." He realized he was rambling and took a deep inhale to calm his nerves. "We were hoping you'd have an idea of what to do. Because at this point we're winging it."

"Can you change into your ghost form?" Colleen asked, and Lance didn't miss the hint of excitement in her eyes despite her concerned tone.

"I... well, I'm kind of not sure... it hurts more when I'm ghost so I've just been staying human for now."

"Let's take a look at the damage in the lab," Sam said with a beckoning of his head before he started to head down the hallway and Colleen followed.

Lance looked over at Pidge with an uncertainty in his eyes. "Feels like I'm going into an operating room."

"You probably are," Pidge muttered a bit too quietly for him to hear.

"What?"

"What?" She picked up her pace just enough to avoid him.

The lab was starting to become a place of familiarity for Lance, much to his annoyance. The alternate dimension portal was no longer an object of confusion but something that triggered a strange feeling of chagrin. He wasn't exactly scared or reluctant to be around the device that was the genesis of all his problems, but there was a bitter contempt that filled his chest at the sight of it.

Sam and Colleen alike were rifling through a drawer as they muttered various scientific sounding things to each other. Lance stood next to Pidge and watched her parents apprehensively, keeping his eyes on them as he turned his head slightly to speak to her in a hushed tone.

"You don't think they'll do anything too weird, do you?"

"These are my parents you're talking about. They built an _alternate dimension portal._ " Realizing this wouldn't help his nerves in the slightest, she let out a soft exhale and spoke sensitively. "I'm sure they'll just want to make sure you're okay. They're not going to cause harm to a wound."

"I think no matter what they do to my wound it's going to cause harm."

She twisted her lips into a frown. "Valid point."

The Holts had Lance take off his shirt and they instantly became fascinated with the injury and the electric green blood that adorned his skin. After their first inspection they got out an examination table where he laid on his stomach while they took a closer look with a variety of medical-like instruments and scanning devices. After some convincing (and whining) on Lance's part, Pidge left and returned with popsicles. Since he had to keep his arms along his sides to prevent moving his shoulder blades, Pidge had to hold out his popsicle for him.

"Mmmm bis iffs duhlwishish."

"Don't talk and suck at the same time," Pidge commented irritably, which elicited a muffled snort from Lance. She rolled her eyes. "Also, Hunk said he contacted your parents to let them know you're fine. Even though you're clearly not."

"Oh bless Hunk." He sucked on the lime popsicle a moment then pulled away to add, "I know my mom would have had a heart attack if she didn't find out if I was okay within five minutes of hearing about the school."

"You might have to make up having a concussion or something so your family doesn't worry about why you look so dead." She paused to take a small bite of her grape popsicle. "If only you could turn your wound invisible but keep the rest of yourself human looking."

"I probably _can,_ actually," he mused with a frown. "I wonder if Chulatt could teach me a thing or two."

"Chulatt?"

"The cute little blue mouse that helped us at school? Well, when I say _little_ I mean little compared to the other ghost mice." He clamped his mouth over his popsicle, making an obnoxious slurping sound.

"Stop that," Pidge groaned, pulling the treat out of the reach of his lips. "That's so… interesting… that ghosts who normally don't talk can still talk with you."

"Just another perk," he said dryly.

"Lance?" Colleen asked in a cautious tone that made his heart sink. "How difficult is it for you to turn intangible?"

His eyes shifted nervously before they landed on Pidge's anxious expression. "Not entirely difficult, why?"

"It looks like there's a shard of glass wedged between your T8 and T9."

Pidge swore which caused Colleen to angrily whisper her full name. Lance meanwhile, was lost. "Whhhhaaaaaat does that mean?"

"Your T8 and T9 are the thoracic sections of your vertebrae," Pidge explained.

"You are super adorable when you talk nerdy like that, but I still have no idea what that means."

Pidge couldn't stop the embarrassed blush that crept into her cheeks. "Your spine disks have a piece of glass stuck in between them."

"Oh shi-" He quickly covered up his profanity by popping his mouth over his popsicle again, narrowly avoiding a reprimand from Mrs. Holt, whom he could feel was narrowing her eyes at him.

"We're not sure how to get it out," Sam said, "without causing further damage. But if you can turn just your spine intangible, it should be a lot easier to work on removing it."

Lance made a face of stupor. "Eye dun no ow two-" Pidge pulled the popsicle out of his mouth. "I don't know how to turn only parts of my body intangible... much less a section of my skeleton..."

"Otherwise we're going to have to put you under and perform surgery-"

"But I'm sure I can quickly figure it out!!!" he piped up feverishly. "Pidge! Give me a body part to turn intangible!"

"Uhhh...." She moved her eyes over his body (and tried not to linger on his back muscles) and figured it would probably be easier if he took it in larger chunks until he achieved precision. "How about you try to make everything from the waist down intangible? And then you can try doing one leg, and then one arm, a hand, and then a finger."

"Ooooh, smart. Kay." He bit his lower lip in concentration. "I'm going... _intangible."_

Pidge let out a sigh and took another bite of her popsicle. "You just went full ghost, Lance."

"I did? Dang it."

Lance continued his attempts to master his control over his solidity, all while the Holts energetically studied him, but his efforts were fruitless and he was becoming more and more exhausted. Colleen eventually came up with an idea but it involved sticking a needle in Lance by surprise and putting him under.

When he awoke, the first thing he saw were the soft curls of Pidge's short honey hair. It wasn't partially tied up like it usually was, but instead hung loose around her neck and shoulders. He was lying on his stomach, head turned to see Pidge sitting on the floor with her back up against the couch only a foot from his face. He must have made a sound when he stirred from consciousness because it wasn't long before she turned around to kneel and look at him.

Her brows lowered in worry. "How are you feeling?"

"Awful," he moaned. While there was a definite pain in his back, it wasn't as bad as before but he felt an intense soreness all over his body. "What... happened, exactly? Last I remember I was trying to make my left hand intangible and failing miserably."

"My parents got the shard of glass out."

"Your parents- _what??_ " He lifted his head and tried to look over his shoulder but Pidge gently pushed her hand against his jaw before he could hurt himself more.

"My mom had the brilliant idea of using our stores of ectoplasm as a steroid of sorts," she explained calmly. "And we were able to operate on you while you were in your ghost form - solid, that is - which seems to be far more indestructible than your human body."

"Oh..." Part of him was glad that everything went smoothly and better than he could have expected, but another part of him was slightly horrified at this information. The more he thought about his ghostly form the more his stomach became increasingly uncomfortable. It was something he elected not to think about and instead roll with all the strange, increasingly less human aspects of his new, apparently permanent condition. This wasn't exactly a problem he could choose to ignore until it went away. While he may have been handling it alright now, he knew there would come a day when the reality would come crashing down and he'd reach his breaking point.

"Hey." Pidge's tender voice broke him from his wandering. His eyes met hers and somehow her concerned amber hues caused the agitated butterflies to settle within his chest. "You're going to be alright."

Lance stared at her a bit longer before letting out a neutral hum and closing his eyes to rest.


	4. Kindred Spirits

_Number of ghosts I've had to fight in the last week: 37.  
_ _Times my family nearly found out my secret and/or tried to kill me: 3.  
_ _Experimental tests the Holts have run on me: 19.  
_ _Assignments due this weekend: 7._

Lance had a lot on his plate. Ever since the incident at the school with the ghost rats and his back injury, things became more difficult and more in number. On top of fighting random ghosts since he now had greatness and responsibility thrust upon him, Chulatt and three more mice befriended him and spent a lot of time at the Holt house while they tried to help Lance master his abilities in between sessions of Colleen and Sam running various tests on him. The little sleep he got during nights constantly interrupted by ghost fights were filled with strange nightmares. He grew dangerously uncomfortable with each lie he constructed for his parents and siblings to hide what he had become and their concerns that he was 'going through a hard time' only made everything more difficult. When his mother insisted he see a therapist he couldn't say no.

He couldn't exactly reassure her that he wasn't depressed and instead he was dealing with the stress of becoming a ghost… and a part of him was thinking he might actually be depressed. While a therapist might have done him good in his current state, Lance saw it as just another person in his life he had to lie to. Maybe he could pull off the depression guise as a cover for his family and teachers and classmates. He was already spiraling in that direction, he just had to omit the ghost parts.

His therapist happened to be Hunk's father, Hank. Lance was uncertain if the familiarity made the therapy easier or if having to lie to another close friend turned it into an hour of guilt and frustration. If it was a stranger maybe he could be completely honest and the therapist could diagnose him as hallucinating and delusional. Now that he thought about it, that was probably worse.

Hank's next question drew him out of the mess of his thoughts.

"What are some things that make you angry?"

"Angry?" He looked up at Hank, blinking a few times. Most of the questions were easy ones he could mostly answer truthfully, but this one threw him for a loop. "I don't… I don't really get _mad_ … like ever. Irritated at my siblings, sure, but… I don't think anything in particular makes me truly angry."

"There's nothing you can think of that makes you want to punch something? A frustration, or jealousy, or resentfulness?"

He frowned. "No, not really. I mean, I can get competitive at times but I think that's different."

Hank let out a hum and wrote something down - something Lance quickly learned he hated about therapy sessions - and then laid his hands flat on the desk as he gave Lance his full attention. "You seem to be someone who deals with stress internally rather than externally."

"What does that mean?"

"When things get difficult and you're at a peaking point, instead of letting off some steam at the gym or snapping at someone when you don't mean to, you probably hole up in your room and have a breakdown, am I right?"

Lance let out a sad sigh. "Last Tuesday, to be exact."

"While this may seem like a functional coping mechanism, it isn't. Allowing all that stress to build up inside you without any release will only make you feel inadequate and hopeless. My goal for you this week is to be open-minded about your feelings with your friends and loved ones. Let them know if you're having a bad day. Tell someone when you're feeling worthless. Don't allow a thought to take root in your heart and instead speak it. If people know they can take the necessary steps to help you feel better."

"So just… talk about it more?"

Hank nodded. "That's the first step I want you to take. If you are too scared to tell someone or you're alone, write down your feelings in a journal. Just the act of acknowledging those feelings externally can help us to recognize they're irrational. If we keep them inside our heads we will eventually believe them." He leaned to the side and pulled open one of his drawers, reaching a hand out to give Lance a simple composition notebook. "Write in that every day, even if it's only one sentence about how you felt. If you're too uncomfortable talking to others about this, at least express it to yourself in writing. But I want you to try opening up to others, okay?"

Lance pursed his lips together as he stared at the notebook within his hands. "Alright," he answered without looking up. "I can try."

* * *

"Where were you?? I was getting worried," Pidge said as soon as Lance came over an hour and a half later than usual to the Holts' living room which was currently filled with four giant ghost mice. Platt was snoring on the coffee table while Chulatt and Chuchulle were running around playing tag, and Plachu phased through one of the walls but quickly slipped back away as soon as he saw Lance.

" _Therapy_ ," he lamented.

She raised her brows. "That…oh. Wow. You're going to therapy now? Since when?"

Lance groaned for way too long as he plopped himself down on the couch next to her, lifting one leg up onto the coffee table. "My mom _insisted._ And of course it's with Hunk's dad."

"That's a good thing though, right?"

"I don't know anymore. Where's a _ghost_ therapist when I need one??"

Chulatt stopped running, causing Chuchulle to smash into her. _I could be your therapist!! s_ he squeaked.

"I don't know about that," he laughed, giving the blue mouse a sad smile. "You'd probably just advise me to eat more string cheese to make my ghost bones stronger, right?"

Chuchulle covered her gasping mouth with her paws as Chulatt's jaw hung loosely in shock. _How could you have known??!!_

 _He must be psychic,_ Plachu offered monotonously from where he stuck out half-way from the wall.

 _Ooooo that's a rare ghost ability!_ Chuchulle chimed.

"It's _actually_ a ghost ability?" Lance asked with a frown.

Pidge sighed. "I wish I could understand what you weirdos were saying," she said more wistfully than tepidly. "So how was therapy? You're still in one piece, I see."

"It was… okay, I guess." He wasn't really sure how to answer her without sounding too despondent. "I have to 'open myself up to others,' as Hank worded it."

She let out a thoughtful hum. "I'll keep in mind to really ask you how you're doing, but I feel like we're pretty transparent with each other."

Lance deadpanned and blinked at her a few times. " _Transparent,_ Pidge? Really?"

Realizing her choice of words, Pidge bust out laughing and sure enough, Lance joined in as well. "Okay not like _that_ , although you do take being transparent to a whole new level. But speaking of… have you considered confiding in one of your siblings about all of this?"

"About therapy?" He arched a brow.

"About being a _ghost."_

He quickly stilled, his expression turning rigid. "I don't have a _death wish_ , Pidge."

"You're really close to Veronica, I'm sure she'd understand. You should at least _try_. I think it would be really good for you to have someone in your family who knows. You wouldn't have to have your guard up 24/7 and your home wouldn't be so much of a metaphorical minefield."

"You don't understand." He let out a sigh of frustration as he thought for a moment on how to best explain it. He knew Pidge meant well so he wasn't exactly mad at her, but he wanted her to better understand the delicate tightrope that was now his life at home. "The reality of ghosts has been ingrained into my family since we were all children. It's like when kids believe in Santa Claus even though they've never seen him. Even if some of my siblings aren't nearly as superstitious as my parents, they know ghosts are real. When I realized what had happened to me and that I wasn't dreaming or hallucinating I… I had never felt so scared as I did in that moment." He paused for a beat as if he were willing himself to say the next part or keep his tears back from his already glossy eyes. "Not just because I was afraid of what my family would do if they found out, but… I was terrified of _myself._ Everything I was taught as a child was true. And I had become the monster of my nightmares."

Pidge sat there, unsure of how to react. She bit her lower lip and took a deep inhale through her nose as she tried to understand the kind of emotional stress Lance had harbored for so long. She placed a supportive hand on his knee, forcing him to look at her. "For what it's worth… _I_ don't see you that way."

While he knew her words were genuine they did little to comfort him. He let out a long exhale, swallowing hard as he tried to keep his emotions in check. "I know… I'm… I'm just terrified of any of them ever finding out what I've become. I-I don't know if they would just disown me or if they'd even try to... you know... _kill_ me."

"They would not try to kill you," she reassured him.

"But what if they don't even believe I'm Lance anymore, just some ghost impersonating their son? They would definitely try to kill me."

"You may be right." She wanted to argue that was exactly why he needed to confide in one of his siblings - someone who could vouch for him - but she didn't want to push it since he was already coiled so tightly with anxiety. She gave his knee a squeeze before standing up and turning to better face him. "Just remain diligent in keeping your second life a secret for now and we'll figure something out. This isn't exactly something you can hide from them forever."

He looked down at the ground with a defeated expression. "I know. I'm dreading the day that they find out though."

Pidge's eyes narrowed sympathetically as her heart ached for him. She didn't know what to say to comfort him. For all she knew, his family might disown him or try to kill him as he had said. She knew how much Lance loved his family and to be stuck in such a predicament must have rent him apart. "No matter what happens, you know I'll always be by your side to support you, right?"

Lance looked up at her, the uncertainty and fear slowly fading from his eyes. "Yeah…" He offered her a sad smile and it was enough to give her hope that he would pull through his current grief. "I know."

* * *

Lance set down his tray of lunch a little too loudly as he plopped down next to Pidge and across from Hunk. "I swear, I've seen the transfer student from somewhere."

All three of them looked over at the kid sitting by himself four bench tables away. In the midst of their observation, Pidge offered dully, "You probably just ran into him at the store or something."

"No, I feel like I've _talked_ with him before. Which can't be possible if I've never met him."

"Maybe this is a weird ghost ability?" Hunk suggested. "Some kinda... 'vibe' you can sense or something?"

Lance took his eyes off of the kid with the mullet and looked at Hunk. "Nah, it's nothing like that. Although…" He let out a long sigh that felt cold as it left his throat. He was sensing more and more ghosts every day. "Still more ghosts," he reported with a groan of frustration. He knew he'd be busy tonight if he wanted to keep his family from doing something about the ghosts and possibly seeing him in his ghost form. "How come _now_ there's all these ghosts out of the blue?"

"Not to be a dramatic cinema," Pidge started, her eyes remaining fixed on the transfer student, "But they're probably here because they can sense you were recently turned into one, and that definitely shouldn't have happened."

"An autonomy."

She twisted her face in momentary confusion. "I think you mean an anomaly."

"Yeah. That."

"Although, really… it's kinda both," Hunk said. "You're the one who stepped in the machine. That's autonomous behavior that led to an anomaly. Autonomous anomaly. Anomalous autonomy."

"Hunk," Pidge cut through tersely.

"That reminds me!!" Lance said dramatically as he slapped his hands down on the table. "When were you going to tell me your name is actually _HANK??"_

"You didn't know that?" Pidge asked dryly with one raised eyebrow.

"NOOOO he introduced himself as Hunk when we were kids! I thought his dad being Hank was one of those 'name everyone in the family similarly' kind of things. Like how my neighbors have a Maria, Mia, and Martha and they're not even triplets." He turned his attention back to Hunk, his face still fuming. "You've been lying to me this whole time!"

"I thought it was self-explanatory!" Hunk defended.

"That would be like my dad being Lance and so I go by Lonce as a nickname to avoid confusion. How are you supposed to figure that out??"

"Allura calls you Lonce."

"Irrelevant, _Hank!"_

Pidge let out a snort as she tried to hold back her laughter but Lance kept on rambling. "When I was eight I found out Pidge was actually _Katie_ and I don't find out until I'm nineteen that Hunk is actually _Hank_ \- what next? Matt is actually Mathias??"

"Well…" Pidge looked up at him with a frown. "Matthew."

" _WHAT!"_

"That's a _normal_ name and nickname, Lance."

He let out a long sigh, still feeling betrayed by the fact that his two best friends deceived him with different names, Hunk superseding Pidge by a long shot. "Well fine! It's a good thing I like calling you guys Pidge and Hunk instead of Katie and Hank." He turned his head to see Pidge staring at him, looking like she was struggling to hold back laughter, her eyes mischievous. He knit his brows together in frustration. " _What. Is that look for."_

"Katie is actually a nickname for Katheryn."

Lance very calmly turned his head to look straight ahead, his expression unreadable as he clenched his silverware. He turned his head slightly away from Pidge and said, "Can you believe this?"

"Katie is a normal nickname for Katheryn," Hunk said as if it needed to be explained.

"I know, I know. It's crazy."

"It's… not that unheard of, Lance," Pidge said with a hint of concern.

"Oh, sorry, I'm talking to Chulatt." He pointed with his fork to the middle of the table to his right. "She's chilling right there."

"She is??" Hunk asked as if he were an arachnophobe and was just informed there was a tarantula wandering on the table.

"How can you see her if she's invisible?" Pidge asked.

Lance blew a raspberry, waving a hand dismissively. "Don't you know ghosts can't hide from ghosts? That would like… defeat the purpose." Even though the others couldn't see her, Lance saw the mouse faintly outlined in white, but otherwise see-through.

 _But when you're human I can't tell you're a ghost aside from the fact you can understand me and see me when invisible,_ Chulatt told him. _So I think you're an anomaly._

"An _autonomous_ anomaly," he added as if that correction were important. "Anomalous autonomy."

" _Please_ stop saying those stupid phrases," Pidge pleaded in irritation.

Lance and Hunk looked at each other for a second before looking at Pidge and saying in unison, "An autonomous anomaly. Anomalous autonomy."

Pidge groaned loudly as she shoved mashed potatoes into her mouth.

* * *

"Mom, where's Lance?" Veronica asked as she entered the house. Mrs. Villianueva was finishing up cleaning in the kitchen and answered her daughter without turning away from the sink.

"He's in his room doing homework, dear."

Veronica moved swiftly down the hall to her brother's room to find he wasn't there. His window was locked so he couldn't have snuck out that way and she knew their mother would have heard him trying to sneak past the kitchen. Despite her inconspicuous nature, she knew everything that happened in her house.

Lance was about to phase through the siding and into his room when he slammed on his breaks at the sight of Veronica, right before he hit the wall. He let out a curse and booked it into the unoccupied bathroom, made himself human, carefully closed the door and flushed the toilet. He proceeded to wash his hands and open the door as loudly as he could as he stepped into the hallway.

"Hey," he greeted his sister casually when he entered his room. "How was work?"

"Where are your textbooks?" she asked with an unimpressed expression.

"My-" He looked around to find his room had absolutely nothing studious out to look like he had been working on homework like he told his mom. He mentally facepalmed at the carelessness of his alibi. He offered his sister a sheepish grin. "Guilty as charged? I was on my phone."

She looked at him a moment longer as if her icy hues could detect lies. She let out a huff of a sigh. "Geez, Lance. Maybe you _should_ keep studying at Katie's."

" _Katheryn's,_ " he corrected with an indignant scoff. He still wasn't over the whole Hank Jr. thing. "Veronica ain't short for anything, right?"

"No??" She raised an eyebrow.

"Alright, just checking."

* * *

"I think Veronica is on to me," Lance explained. Pidge and Hunk were working on some invention in one of the Holt labs while Lance tried to make some progress on his English assignment. "I totally made eye contact with her on her way home from work and I was a ghost at the time. And then she was in my room before I could get back."

"Yikes," Hunk said without looking up from the pieces of metal he was working on screwing together. "Did she say anything?"

"Not really, but… I can tell she's suspicious."

"We probably need to establish an alter ego for you," he suggested. "Like Clark Kent and Superman."

"Ooooh, yeah! Pidge, you got any pairs of glasses I could borrow?" He knew she had a few pairs she rotated depending on her mood for aesthetic purposes. She was currently sporting a pair of blue-tinted ones that made her look like some kind of tech genius.

"Yeah, hold on." She ran off to her room and returned with some simple square frames. "These are my most masculine pair - otherwise the rest are more fitted for my heart-shaped face."

Lance put them on and blinked a few times. He placed his hands on his hips and looked at Pidge and Hunk. "How do I look?"

Pidge frowned. "You know the saying that people look smarter when they wear glasses isn't always true? But… you pull it off quite nicely."

"Oooooh I do??" He held his jawline and grinned at her. "So if I want to flirt with a smart chick I should wear these."

She stammered, her face growing red. "Y-you have more important things to do than flirt with random girls, Lance!" She quickly made her hands busy assembling parts of their current invention so she could avoid eye contact with him.

"Hate to break the excitement," Hunk started, "but wouldn't wearing glasses be useless? Ghosts certainly don't need 'em and Lance's family would know he doesn't use them so it would only work on people who don't know he already has 20/20 vision."

"Yeah… Hunk makes a valid point," Pidge said with a wistful sigh. He really _did_ look good in the glasses.

"Okay, so the glasses probably aren't going to cut it," Lance huffed. "I don't know what else to do to disguise my identity… I mean if I change up my hairstyle it'll be the same when I'm a ghost."

"Perhaps an alias?" Hunk suggested.

"A what?"

Pidge sighed. "Your 'superhero' name."

"Oh!! Hmm… what about… Pike?"

" _Pike?"_

"It's basically another type of lance!" He beamed at her, clearly proud that he came up with that one.

Of course, Lance would be the one to not know the word "alias" but know all the different types of lances as if it were important information. Pidge shook her head, laughing. "Might as well call yourself 'Pole.'"

"Ooh, then I'd be a _pole_ -tergeist." He gently elbowed her. "Eh??"

"Did you seriously just make a ghost pun?"

"I don't know what I'm booing."

Pidge looked so proud of him. "That's the _spirit!"_

"Oooh, what about…" He paused for dramatic effect. "The Phantom Lance. You know, like the Phantom Menace?"

"Lance," Hunk cut in like a scolding mother, "Having an alias that still has your name in it defeats the entire purpose of having an alias."

"Most people are dumb."

"Says the one failing Chemistry," Pidge jabbed. 

"Heeey, a D minus is not failing!" He crossed his arms, letting out a pout. "Well fine, can either of you come up with anything more clever?"

She frowned for a moment as she pondered possibilities. A distinguishing trait Lance had from other ghosts was that he retained his human skin tone, whereas most ghosts were purple or green. She figured a name that struck with his humanity would be a good moniker. "How about the Phantom Paladin?"

"Paladin? Isn't that like a soldier?"

"Yes, and paladins have a connotation of being good and protective. And those are two traits that are hard to find among ghosts. It would help convince others that you are not an enemy despite your appearance."

"Hmm… I like it! You're so clever, Pidge."

She shrugged. "I try."

* * *

Lance was starting to get a rhythm with his double life - the ghosts he fought at night were becoming easier as he gained better control of his powers. He was also getting proficient at falling asleep quickly so he could muster at least five hours every night, up to seven on a good night. Afternoon naps became a must, but luckily hostile ghosts didn't make many appearances in daylight.

Even his therapy sessions were becoming more manageable. Lance enjoyed talking with Hunk's dad but he thought the constant lying would make the sessions unbearable. To his pleasant surprise, in most sessions they didn't talk about specifics but more of how he was feeling and how to deal with such emotions. If there ever was a necessity for specifics Lance usually made it about school or his relationships with his friends and family. That alone still gave them plenty to talk about.

Veronica was becoming increasingly more nosy and Lance reckoned it was only a matter of time before she found out because he slipped up somewhere in his cover. Pidge and Hunk did their best to back him up on reasons why he got home late or had to suddenly leave in the middle of dinner because Pidge detected a hostile ghost. She invented some kind of radar that pinpointed the location of any ghosts within the town which made it tremendously easier to nullify the threats. It was interesting to learn that Lance didn't create a dot on the map until he turned ghost, much like how Chulatt couldn't tell he was a ghost when he was human.

The only problem with the radar was the fact that Pidge kept texting him about ghosts to deal with that he otherwise wouldn't have known about until a commotion arose. Pidge also calculated that there was another "paladin ghost," one who was helping Lance nullify the threats. It certainly got annoying when she told him about a ghost across town only to have the other paladin ghost take care of it when Lance was already halfway there.

One night at dinner he got an alarming text from Pidge:

_Paladin ghost is struggling with a big one._

Lance swallowed hard. _She can tell how big they are now??_ he thought in worry. He looked up from his phone dramatically. "Oh shoot is that the time? I gotta be at Hunk's."

"At… 7:18?" Veronica asked dubiously.

"7:15, actually," he stammered.

" _That's_ a weird time to meet up."

"Kay byeeeeee~" Lance bolted from his chair and made sure to grab his backpack to make it look like he was going over to study. He texted Pidge asking for an address, set his backpack below his bedroom window outside, looked up the address in his maps phone app, then checked his surroundings before going ghost and flying over to the location she provided him.

He'd recognize that mullet anywhere.

The paladin ghost was the stranger in his dream-not-dream the first night he turned ghost.

He was fighting a massive ghost that looked more alien than human but had skin (fur?) the same purple shade as the paladin ghost. The enemy had giant triangular ears on his head but what stood out to Lance was the terrifying mechanical arm that was performing all kinds of dangerous attacks against the Mullet. He dodged them gracefully but Lance could tell that he was wearing thin.

"Hey!" Lance meant to catch the attention of the paladin ghost but the enemy trained his one glowing yellow eye on him as well. "Uh oh." He narrowly avoided an attack from the scary looking arm.

"What are you doing here?" Mullet asked, exasperated.

"I came to help, Mr. Ungrateful!" Lance piped, seeing that the boy was scuffed up pretty badly now that he got closer. Bright green blood cascaded down the side of his purple face in disturbing contrast. "Looks like you could use it too."

"I don't need an amateur to come in and get himself injured! Especially not around Sendak!"

"Sendak?" He assumed that was the enemy's name. "What's so special about him?"

"So nice of you to show up, Lance," Sendak purred, his mechanical arm recharging with an ominous hum. "I've been looking for you."

"H-how do you know my name?"

"Easy. You think I don't communicate with any of the ghosts you've fought? The swarm of rats I sent to the school was recon to confirm my suspicions were right. When I learned there was not only one, but _two_ half-breeds in this town… well…" He gave a darkly fascinated chuckle. "I had to come and hunt down such rarities."

"Wait… half-breeds?" Lance slowly turned his head to the paladin ghost. "You're human too?"

Before he could answer, Sendak was blasting them with a beam of bright purple energy that tore up the concrete where they both once stood.

"Focus!" Mullet reprimanded. "One hit from that and you're dead!"

"Aren't we already dead?" Lance scoffed, feeling reminiscent of their first meeting when he thought he was dreaming. He circled around to try and shoot Sendak's mechanical arm from behind but he moved surprisingly fast for his size.

The other ghost visibly facepalmed before letting out an annoyed growl and disappearing into the concrete. Even though ghosts couldn't hide from other ghosts, Sendak was now distracted fighting Lance as he tried to pinpoint where the other ghost would ambush him. This gave Lance a window to blast the enemy's arm with his ice rays, effectively freezing the mechanical arm.

"HA!" Lance blurted, Sendak's furious yellow eye now trained on him. It was just the right amount of distraction for the other paladin ghost to emerge from the ground, slicing Sendak across the chest with an ectoplasm blade. He fell over with a grunt, crashing hard onto the concrete.

"Quick, pin him down with your ice!"

Lance did so, blasting ice at Sendak's wrists and ankles as Mullet did something he had never seen before. He half knelt on the ground, one hand placed on the ground like a football player ready to touch down, vibrant purple waves circling on the ground around Sendak. The paladin ghost slowly lifted into the air as the ground below became a black void, swirling with purple electricity. Lance watched in fascination as the other ghost's eyes glowed an even brighter amethyst and he blasted Sendak into the portal before it disappeared completely. He collapsed down onto his knees, panting from exhaustion as he slowly reverted back into his human form, his skin turning pale and his hair darkening into a raven black.

All of Lance's suspicions came to a crashing conclusion when he saw it was the transfer student.

He gasped dramatically and pointed an accusing finger at him. "Y-you're - you're KEITH??!"

"Yeah."

"Is that even your real name? Or do you have a… more 'ghostly' name?"

"No, my name is Keith."

"Really? That's so… anticlimactic."

Keith rolled his eyes, but Lance continued rambling as he touched down to the ground and turned human again. "But what was that stunt you just pulled?? Was that like… a portal? Where'd Sendak go? Or is he _… dead_?! And not dead like we're dead, but dead-dead. How did you even do that?"

Keith took a slow inhale and exhale. There was still ghost blood all over the side of his face and his dark eyes looked exhausted. "It's a special ability only certain ghosts can do. My mom is one of them so I inherited it, but… it takes _a lot_ of energy to make even a portal that small. And it was a random destination, which is fine for sending Sendak away somewhere, but once I get better at it I can pinpoint where I want the portal to go."

Lance was about to point out that his portal was _huge_ and had to wonder how big they could get if Keith considered that size small. But a more pressing question on his mind was how Keith said his mother was a ghost but somehow he was half and half and capable of turning human. "How… you said your mom is a ghost, so how are you half-human? How are you like me?"

"I'm half-ghost, half-human. You do the math," he answered plainly, turning to leave. "If that idiot brain of yours can."

Lance wanted to ask Keith more questions, but his taunt was throwing him off and he was moving further down the street. "I got my grade in calculus up to a B minus!!" he yelled, eliciting no response from Keith as he became smaller and smaller. Lance frowned and pulled out his phone to text Pidge as he walked back home.

_The paladin ghost's name is Keith. And he's a jerk._

* * *

Despite the rhythm that began to form in Lance's intense schedule, he was starting to feel the stress of it all come crashing down. It became evident when he was writing out his frustrations in his journal only to have it turn into angry scribbles that marred the entire page. He chucked the notebook across his room, burying his face into his hands as the weight of everything pinned him down.

After a while his phone vibrated on the bed from a call. He ignored it.

More time passed and it vibrated again. He didn't have the energy to care.

Eventually there was a knock on his door which jerked Lance into turning invisible, but the voice on the other side belonged to Pidge. "Lance? Are you in there?" She waited against silence but after a long moment she slowly opened the door to find his room empty. She made her way to sit on his bed, her feet dangling above the floor. She looked around at all the space posters on his walls as if she'd find some kind of clue as to where he was.

"I know you're in here. You show up on the radar."

A disembodied groan sounded from the floor. "Even with the curse of invisibility I can't utilize it like any normal person would."

Her face softened. Lance wanted to hide and maybe she should have left him in his room when she received silence as her answer, but she also knew Lance had a limited number of people he could talk to concerning the half of his life he kept hidden. She scooted off his bed and sat down on the floor so she was closer to him even though he was still invisible.

"I got worried when you didn't respond to my texts for an hour," she explained. Lance was always quick to respond to messages, in fact it was usually annoying to Pidge how fast he replied. "And when you didn't answer my calls I… I don't know. You could have been injured or captured by another ghost. I always worry that you're in some kind of danger…"

"I usually am," he groaned. "And personally I'm getting real tired of it." The ire faded in his voice as it became barely above a whisper. "I'm so tired of being scared all the time, Pidge."

She had nowhere to look so she cast her eyes to the general direction of his voice. "It's okay to be scared, Lance. It's what makes you human."

He turned visible at those words, his body phased half-way through the floor as if it were water and he was floating on his back. Even with his vibrant green eyes she could tell they were glossy. He was a lot closer to her than she anticipated, and with his head near her feet she could tell that his ghostly eyes actually had pupils. They were so close in color to the neon of his irises that they could only be seen in close proximity. Eyes that she thought were eerie at first had transformed into something beautifully vexing and she couldn't pull her gaze away.

He stared at her, hopeful, for a moment longer before shifting his eyes away. "It'd be nice if it could literally make me human. I'm… kinda stuck like this right now."

She knew from past experience that Lance automatically reverted to his ghost form when his emotions became too overwhelming. It seemed he had to be in a calm state of mind to revert himself back, and that kind of dichotomy had to leave him feeling less and less human if he had to work at it to become such. "At least…" she started, offering him a sad smile. "At least it's not the opposite. Can you imagine if you were in the middle of a fight and were stuck human and defenseless?"

Lance glanced at her but quickly looked away, despondent. "I… I feel like I spend more time like this… than as myself. I…" His voice was thick with emotion, the words trembling as he struggled to voice them. "I feel like a part of me has _died_ , Pidge… I don't feel like the Lance I used to be, I'm… how am I supposed to be myself when I can't even interact with my family the same anymore? When I can't hug my own mother without the anxiety that I'll accidentally turn in front of her? When I have to look at my best friend and see the fear in his eyes whenever I'm ghost? When I can't even sit in my room to cry and remain human?"

Pidge couldn't answer any of his questions. There were a lot of questions revolving around Lance which she couldn't answer, but she wished in this moment that she could give him some kind of reassuring proof that he was human. Her data from research would say otherwise, but his actions spoke of his humanity far louder than any statistic. 

She moved forward to kneel beside him, moving instinctively to lay her hand down and hold his but was hit with the painful realization that she _couldn't._ She curled her fingers around his palm even though it passed through him like a hologram, feeling a hollowness at her inability to comfort him. Lance looked down at their hands, adjusting his fingers to look like he held her back even though he couldn't physically feel her comfort. He bit his lip and moved his eyes to stare at the ceiling where his glow-in-the-dark stars started to glow similar to his ghostly aura in the twilight of his room.

Neither of them said anything to break the thickness of their heartache but instead silently shed tears in the wake of their helplessness.


	5. The Phantom Menace

"I still don't understand why I have to come along," Lance whined.

"Because you're mom and dad's science project," Matt answered bluntly as he walked by with his suitcase in tow.

Pidge scoffed. "Well, he's not wrong, but I really _do_ need to help you with your physics midterm project like we told your mom."

Lance let out a dramatic groan. "Homework while on vacation? It just seems _wrong_."

Despite all of his complaining, he sometimes forgot the Holts were rich. The science convention in Boston was nothing short of ritzy, and he had never seen a nicer hotel in his entire life. The fancy breakfast that was delivered to their suite was one of the best meals Lance had ever indulged, and that was saying something considering the fine quality of Hunk's home-cooked meals.

The first day was lowkey. The Holts gave presentations and attended various seminars while Lance, Pidge, and Matt stayed at the hotel. Lance actually worked on his project and got a good chunk of it completed thanks to the Holt siblings, and doing homework was somewhat more bearable when it was done in a swanky hotel room.

He gave a dramatic gasp from the desk where he worked. "I could probably get room service to deliver me fancy string cheese."

"I don't think rich people eat string cheese, Lance," Pidge reprimanded.

He defiantly pulled out the order menu with a _fwap_ , his eyes glancing over the options. "Ha! _Cheese platter_." He grinned smugly at Pidge on the bed.

"Someone say cheese platter?" Matt poked his head out from the doorway to the adjoined room.

"Yes, and someone is _getting_ one." Lance picked up the phone and started dialing the number. "Hi, yes, I'd like to order a cheese platter for room 417? … Uh n-no, we're minors. Thank you!"

"What, did they offer wine?" she asked.

"Hey, I'm an adult!" Matt whined.

"You _definitely_ don't need to be tipsy on this trip."

"It could be fun. Mom and dad would never even know."

"Oh yes they would. Mom would find out all your sins before you even have a chance to consider repenting of them."

"Uh, guys?" Lance asked, his spine feeling cold. "Hate to interrupt, but I think there's a ghost nearby."

The Holt siblings looked at each other and then at Lance. "What kind of ghost?" Matt asked.

"I can't exactly tell something like that," he said with an unamused expression. "But I can tell it's… either big or powerful or both. I hate it when they're both."

"Are you sure?" Pidge asked. She had her phone out to see there were no green dots within the vicinity of the building. "There's nothing on the radar."

"I swear, it's like… in the hallway or something." They all got up and walked to the door, poking their heads out to see the hallway was abandoned save for a room service maid holding a platter of cheese.

"Here's your request," the lady said sweetly, handing the platter over and Lance took it with a smile. "Enjoy!"

"Thank you!"

They all watched her leave, Lance narrowing her eyes suspiciously. "Wow that was fast." He looked over at Pidge. "You don't think she's half-ghost, do you?"

"Lance, it was probably a false alarm." She frowned, moving back into the room. "You might have just had a frisson instead of a supernatural sense for ghosts."

"A frisson?"

"It's a shiver you feel that isn't from being cold," Matt explained, taking a piece of cheese off the platter Lance still held. "You probably just got excited over cheese."

"I do that all the time but I don't get weird shivers about it." He sighed, the sound turning into a growl at the end. Matt took another cheese as he talked. "You guys don't understand, it's not some supernatural shiver, it literally feels like someone dunked my spine in an ice bath. There's no mistaking that feeling with a shiver."

Pidge let out a small exhale. "Lance, I believe you. But whatever ghost it was doesn't seem to be a threat at the moment, so try to relax, okay?" She leaned forward from her seat on the bed to grab her own cheese with a toothpick. "Mom and Dad said we could explore the Museum of Science all day tomorrow so look forward to that. Plus the gala on Saturday is going to be fun."

He couldn't find it in himself to relax as Matt took another cheese, looking down to see there were only a few left. "Hey!" He whipped his head to Matt who was on his left. "How many have you had?!"

"Dunno, lost count," he said with a mouthful as he grabbed the second to last one.

Lance huffed and popped the last one in his mouth, quickly releasing a pleasured sound. "Oh gosh I love cheese. Especially _fancy_ cheese."

* * *

Lance couldn't rest well in the bed he shared with Matt after feeling for a second time the sense there was a powerful ghost in the building. He had checked Pidge's phone earlier while she was brushing her teeth to find there were no ghosts on the radar, which only made his stomach twist more. It gave him the suspicion that there was a ghost like him in the building, and he knew for certain that Keith didn't fly all the way out to Boston this weekend.

 _Although he can make portals… so technically he_ could _be here…_

He shook his head at the thought. Keith himself said he couldn't pinpoint locations yet for his portals, so there was no way he was here even though he could be in theory. Then who was the other half ghost? Maybe they weren't as uncommon as Lance believed them to be? He had met Keith after all.

Still, he had an uptight sleep.

Despite his exhaustion, he, Matt, and Pidge had an enjoyable time exploring the Science Museum. He loved listening to the Holt siblings get excited over something as they babbled on about technical terms he could barely wrap his head around, and his chest felt warm every time Pidge turned to him with stars in her eyes and explained something to him in simple terms and in great detail. He didn't feel like she was explaining things to him because he was dumb, but rather he got the feeling that she was so enthralled with the subject that she had to share her love of it with someone else.

That alone made the entire day enjoyable and eased his worries from before.

When they entered an exhibit under a blacklight it wasn't long until Pidge tensed up and shoved Lance back out into the entryway as fast as she could, avoiding as many people as she steered him along the edges.

"Wh-what's going on??" he asked as soon as they were out.

"Your eyes were glowing under the blacklight, Lance!"

His eyebrows shot up. "Oh, they were?" He bit his lower lip. "Good catch."

Matt caught up to them, nonchalant. "What's up?"

"Lance's eyes apparently have some kind of fluorescence to them because they were green under the blacklight," Pidge explained.

"Oh cool! Can I see?"

Pidge whacked his upper arm. "We have plenty of blacklights at home, he can show you then." She let out a worried sigh. "I'm just glad no one seemed to notice."

"Do you think I could turn invisible while you guys go through the exhibit?" Lance asked, whining in disappointment. "I really wanted to see the glowing rocks."

"Lance, you can't just turn invisible in a busy museum full of people!!" she quietly hissed. "Besides, I don't know if blacklight would still expose anything when you're invisible."

"Yeah we might see your skeleton or something cool," Matt commented with bright eyes.

"Stop enjoying this."

"So… no glowy rocks?" Lance asked as he looked between the siblings.

"Sorry Lance, but I think this exhibit is out for you."

"Rats. _Ghost_ rats."

"Hey, at least you haven't encountered ghosts on this vacation," she said encouragingly.

Lance snorted. "I actually sensed quite a few last night. But I figured Boston isn't my division, so not my problem. I mean if they can't tell I'm a ghost if I remain human, then why bother unless they cause us trouble?"

"Huh… I guess they're everywhere."

"Our hometown just happens to be much more spoopy," Matt commented.

"I think your parents are at fault for that," Lance deadpanned to both the siblings.

"You sure? I thought alternate dimension portals were a standard in every city."

"Yeah no, I love your parents but they're whack." He turned more serious, bringing his hand up to hold his chin in thought. "Although now that we're in a completely different city, there _is_ something about our town that's… off."

Pidge frowned. "How so?"

"I don't know how to describe it… like there's an energy there that isn't here, or at least isn't as strong."

"Do you think it's because there are more ghosts?"

"No… I've sensed ghosts here as well so I think it's something else." He thought quietly for a moment longer before his eyes narrowed. "Now that I think about it… it feels kind of like the energy I felt when I was in the machine."

Matt chuckled. "The ghost in the machine."

Pidge frowned in one corner of her mouth as she looked at Matt. "Well, you're not wrong." She returned her attention to Lance. "But if you mean the alternate dimension portal, then maybe what you're feeling are rifts between the dimensions, and our town must have more of them."

"What if what Lance is sensing is something more like currents?" Matt asked. "Like electromagnetic currents?" He snapped his fingers a few times as he tried to think of the word. " _Telluric_ currents! Or if we want to get nerdy, we could consider them ley lines."

Lance tilted his head to the side. "Isn't that from Ghostbusters?"

"Oddly fitting, right?"

"You might be onto something though, remember mom's notes?" Pidge asked Matt. "She had a theory that the alternate dimension laid right beneath the surface of our own. If telluric currents act like ley lines, they might be cracks between the dimensions where it's most thin. Perhaps when Lance changed he was exposed to a ley line instead of making it all the way to the other dimension."

"That still doesn't explain how I became half-ghost," Lance said, confused. "Because with that logic shouldn't you become fully ghost if you make it to the other dimension through the portal-thingy?"

"It's because you weren't wearing a safety suit," Matt explained as if it were obvious.

"Well it was probably unstable too," Pidge added. "You were most likely exposed to radiation. After seeing you under the blacklight I think it's safe to say you were exposed to ultraviolet. Probably gamma too, since your DNA was broken down and changed."

"Yeah, your DNA structure is super interesting to study."

Lance sighed. "So _all_ of you Holts have been studying me? Can't one of you grab Keith and study _him?"_

"We can't just _ask_ a guy we barely know if we can experiment on him!" Pidge countered.

"Oh but it's fine to do that to me?"

"You're our friend!"

Lance rolled his eyes. "That makes it so much more acceptable."

The Holt siblings went ahead into the blacklight exhibit while Lance found a secluded bench to sit down and give his mother a call. It was strange how hearing her voice for a few minutes made him homesick when he had only been gone for two days. When they ended their conversation he got a heavy feeling in his stomach at the question of whether or not he'd ever have the courage to tell her what he had become. He had a wild, fleeting moment during the phone call to go ahead and tell her and now he felt ashamed for continuing to keep it a secret, for continuing to lie.

Pidge could tell Lance was feeling down as soon as they returned so the rest of the day she made it a goal to make him laugh as much as she could with her terrible puns and Matt's dry humor. After the museum, they went to a pizza place that had garlic knots, much to Lance's pleasure.

"How was the museum?" Colleen asked that evening as she and her husband returned from their seminars. "Learn anything new?"

"I've learned _too much_ stuff," Lance commented. "I think my head's going to explode."

"We learned Lance glows under blacklight," Matt piped.

Lance grumbled an 'oh no' when he saw both Mr. and Mrs. Holt's faces light up with that very specific scientific excitement that told him they wanted to start experimenting. Pidge must have noticed this in her parents too because she quickly jumped to his defense.

"Mom, dad," her tone was oddly reprimanding, "Save the experimenting for when we get back. Let Lance enjoy his vacation."

Colleen looked like she was holding back a dozen questions but Sam calmly answered with a smile, "Alright dear. We can learn all about it when we're back home. You know, the dinner they served us didn't have _any_ dessert."

Matt gave his father a mischievous look. "So you know what that means."

"Oooh, we calling room service?" Lance asked.

Colleen was already looking over the menu. "Ice cream sounds delightful. What does everyone else think?"

There was a chorus of agreement and as the Holts worked on ordering, Lance turned to Pidge and quietly whispered, "Thank you."

She gave him a soft smile and patted his shoulder in response. 

* * *

If Lance thought the hotel was ritzy, he wasn't prepared for the gala dinner.

He especially wasn't prepared to see Pidge in that dress.

All night he kept stealing glances at her. Even though Pidge usually wore makeup it was always her edgy purple lipstick and winged eyeliner. This time her makeup was much softer, almost delicate, and it felt like he was seeing a part of her she kept hidden. Colleen had somehow twisted her short wild hair back into an elegant bun, part of her bangs still lightly framing her face. He tried averting his distraction by listening to the current speaker at the podium, an old colleague of the Holt's.

"You know, this Lotor guy looks familiar," Lance remarked as he held his chin and observed the man. He was tall with dark skin and long blonde hair (that was no doubt dyed) and sharp, handsome features. He reminded Lance of a politician or a CEO.

"You've probably seen him on TV or in a headline on the internet," Pidge dismissed with a wave of her hand. "The guy's famous."

"Kinda hard to forget once you see him," Matt added. "He's like the obnoxiously good-looking frat boy who steals all the girls' hearts when he isn't even interested in dating any of them."

"Sounds like someone's bitter."

"College life is hard, okay?!"

As the siblings continued to banter, Lance had a bad feeling about Lotor he couldn't quite explain, a chill running down his spine. He tried to shake it off as he delved into his food and stole a quick glance at Pidge. She looked remarkable in that turquoise colored dress. Did she always have those freckles on her shoulders?

When they were done eating, the gala started to get boring, speakers droning on about various things that Lance didn't really care about. He leaned over to Pidge and told her he'd be right back, stood up and left the ballroom. When he found a deserted hallway he blinked a few times to activate his ghost vision, scanning the area for anything suspicious. To his disappointment, there were no signs of any ghosts or ghost activity in the ballroom. But just as Chalatt said, Lance was pretty sure he couldn't detect half-ghosts unless they were in ghost form. He wouldn't get any kind of indication that Lotor was half-ghost unless he went ghost and there was no way he was going to do that in the middle of a gala.

When he returned to the ballroom the boring speeches were over and people were either conversing at the tables or slow dancing to the music in the cleared out center of the spacious room. He found his way over to the Holt's table where none other than Lotor himself was having a conversation with Sam and Colleen. There was a tenseness in the air between the adults that he couldn't quite explain. They sounded cordial with each other but it was as if there was a vile undercurrent to their words.

Lance leaned over to Pidge and held out a hand. "Wanna dance?"

She rapidly blinked up at him, bewildered at his question as if he had just proposed to her. "I- what? Do _you_ want to dance??"

"Yeah, that's why I asked," he said with a chuckle. "It'd be kinda dumb for both of us to be dressed up so nice in a ballroom with music playing and _not_ have at least one dance."

She took his hand and stood up, offering him a soft smile. "Well, I suppose that makes you an opportunist."

"Guilty as charged."

He led her out onto the floor to a spot that wasn't too crowded, feeling butterflies as he placed his hand on her side and took her hand in his. Despite the flapping wings in his stomach he somehow felt calm in Pidge's presence. He constantly stressed about ghost matters but she was a soothing constant in his chaotic double-life.

"You look beautiful in that dress," he commented, feeling the butterflies flap faster.

"You too- aahm, I mean, you look great in a blue suit," she stumbled, feeling her face grow red. He let out a laugh and it was causing her knees to go weak as she laughed alongside him. "But really, it makes the color of your eyes stand out."

He let out a dark snicker. "Probably shouldn't change my eye color then, huh?"

"That's probably for the best. Although then you'd be my two favorite colors."

"Blue and green?" He raised a brow. "Purple isn't one of your favorites?"

She shrugged a shoulder. "I do like purple, but I like blues and greens more. They remind me of the ocean and space, two of my favorite things."

"No way, those are my favorite colors and two of my favorite things too! My family goes to Veradero beach every summer and my sisters and I love to stargaze and find all the constellations. There's nothing quite as cool as looking at the stars while hearing the ocean waves."

"That sounds amazing," she remarked with bright eyes. "Maybe I can convince my family to tag along with yours this summer."

"That would be nice."

The song came to a close but the two of them kept dancing through the next. They danced slowly in comfortable silence, both of them imagining a peaceful summer on the beach together. As much as Lance loved spending that time with his family, the idea of Pidge being there too made him look forward to it even more.

Just when Lance felt himself start to relax and enjoy the evening, the same chill from earlier ran down his spine, only this time with a greater intensity. Pidge noticed his slight flinch and how he grasped her side a little too tightly.

"Lance? You alright?"

He didn't take his eyes off of Lotor as they swayed back and forth. As soon as Lance looked at him, he felt the chill. He seemed to know the Holts and there was something suspicious about him that felt associated with all the bad feelings Lance had ever since they arrived in Boston.

"It's him," Lance whispered suddenly to Pidge as the realization came upon him.

"Lotor?" She looked over at the man before returning her attention to Lance with pensive eyes. "But that would mean he's-"

"Half-ghost," they said simultaneously.

"You don't think he's like you, do you?"

"I thought we both just came to that conclusion-"

"No I mean like you as opposed to Keith. An anomaly, not born that way."

"An autonomous anomaly."

"Because he and my parents were colleagues. What if they were working on the portal back then?" Her words tumbled out of her mouth as she connected the dots she didn't know were there. "They accomplished all kinds of scientific advancements together and then one day Lotor stopped all contact with him. What if that's the reason my parents gave up working on the alternate dimension portal? What if it's because their partner left mid-project because something went wrong and changed him?"

Lance bit his lower lip. "This is bad, right?"

"That a multi-millionaire who hates my parents now has ghost powers? Yeah, I'd classify that as bad."

"What should I do?"

"You?" Pidge looked at him in alarm. "You can't fight him by yourself! It's too dangerous. We don't know how powerful he is or how many ghosts he has helping-"

"If Lotor wants vengeance on your parents for changing him then tonight is the perfect opportunity for him to attack." They were all at the same science convention and he could easily make it look like an accident. Ghosts were, after all, known for being elusive. "If I don't do something, your parents could- or you and Matt-"

"Lance, calm down," Pidge breathed. "We'll be careful and take precautions. You running after him and attacking him isn't the solution here, especially when we don't have all the facts. You definitely don't want to expose yourself when he doesn't know that you're half-ghost."

He let out a long sigh, shifting his fingers laced with her hand before getting comfortable again. "Alright. I'll try not to do anything too stupid. I just… I have a _really_ bad feeling about all of this."

"We'll assess it as the evening progresses, okay? And who knows? Maybe nothing will happen."

Lance frowned, his eyes still trained on Lotor and the Holts. "I somehow doubt it."

* * *

The rest of the gala went by smoothly without any incident. But as they started to clear out of the ballroom when the event was over, a sinking dread came over Lance as he and the Holts made their way up to their hotel room. As soon as he and Matt went to their room and Matt slipped into the shower, Lance turned himself invisible and intangible, sneaking away to investigate. He changed his outfit from his suit to his "Phantom Paladin" armor Pidge helped him design. He normally would appear to be wearing whatever he currently had on but inverted in color, but Keith taught him that he could mentally alter his clothing to be whatever he wanted. Now whenever he went ghost, he wore a black underlayer and white armor with blue accents. He turned his legs into a ghost tail in hopes that it would make him even less recognizable if he ran into Lotor.

Which he did.

He saw the man in the empty ballroom, working on some kind of machinery in a hidden closet. His hands typed away on a laptop, completely unaware of Lance's presence. He was on the far other side of the ballroom, but he hovered halfway through the wall as he watched, waiting for something to tip him off that Lotor was half-ghost. So far he only appeared to be a science nerd, which was fairly obvious.

Then Lance looked more closely at the machinery and noticed something familiar. Panels of a distinct shape and size ran along a wall of the machine and he recognized them as being the same as the ones inside the Holts' alternate dimension portal. Now he knew he was definitely up to something ghostly, but his confirmation was when Lotor turned around and trained his eyes on him.

If he could find Lance that quickly in a large ballroom when he was invisible, that was the only confirmation he needed. Only another ghost would be able to see him as he was.

Calmly and cordially, Lotor finished something on his laptop and then turned to face Lance with his hands clasped in front of him. "What is it you want?"

Lance decided to play dumb. "You can see me?"

"No, I'm merely talking to an empty ballroom."

Despite Lotor's laid-back nature, there was something calculated in his tone and it made Lance uneasy. He swallowed hard but stayed halfway through the wall across the ballroom. "How can you see me? Aren't you human?"

"Not quite."

"Oh. Well…" He wasn't sure where to go from this point. He felt stupid asking more questions about how Lotor was half-ghost but he didn't want to give himself away either and blatantly ask if he was planning on murder this evening. "What's that you're working on?"

"Why don't you come and see?"

Lance hovered there for a moment, evaluating his options. He felt like he was a mouse being lured into a trap and he was about to lose his head when he least expected it. Running away would be too suspicious though, so he reluctantly hovered over to the closet to see the machinery up close, but kept a good six feet between him and Lotor as he explained the two-way portal.

* * *

“What do you mean you don’t know where Lance is?? You were supposed to make sure he stayed here!”

Matt groaned. “He can _literally_ turn invisible and intangible, Pidge. You gave me an impossible mission. He was here in the room before I went and showered,” he explained. “But now he’s gone, unless he’s chilling in the room somewhere invisible and electing to ignore me.”

“He does that sometimes,” Pidge huffed. “I have an idea of where he might be.”

“I’ll come with you,” he started as he took steps to leave the room but she placed a hand on his chest and stopped him.

“No, you stay here. Keep an eye on mom and dad.”

His eyebrows lowered. “What are you not telling me?”

“I’ll explain when I get back, hopefully with Lance.”

She had a feeling this would happen. Lance was acting too paranoid for his own good and when she connected the logic that Lotor may attempt to harm her family it was probably the deciding factor to his reckless behavior. She tried to think where Lotor would be and where Lance would go to find him.

When she entered the ballroom she almost immediately left. It appeared empty but she noticed a hint of blue. As she looked more carefully, maneuvering around empty tables, she saw Lance lying motionless on the ground near one of the corners of the ballroom. She ran as fast as her heels could take her, electing to take them off half-way across the polished wood before she hurt herself (she was an awful klutz in heels and had stepped on Lance’s toes all night long).

“Lance? Lance!” He was unresponsive but she could tell he was breathing from the occasional rising and falling of his chest. She didn’t want to move him for fear of harming an injury she could not see. There were no obvious signs of blood or broken bones but Lance still looked rather beaten up. She grabbed a cushion from one of the benches along the wall and carefully propped in under his head.

“Lance?” she asked again, hoping for some kind of response, even if it was just an incoherent noise, but he was out cold. She took hold of one of his hands, hoping he might be able to grip her back if he couldn’t manage any words, but his hand remained limp within hers.

“Hey, you’re going to be okay,” she said more as reassurance for herself than him. “You’ve gotta be okay, you’re practically indestructible, right?” His lack of response was worrying her further as she realized Lotor had to be half-ghost and the one who hurt him, which meant their suspicions that he would try to hurt her family suddenly became a reality instead of mere possibility. If Lotor wasn’t here because he had finished with Lance, did that mean he was heading upstairs this very moment?

She didn’t want to leave Lance when he was unconscious but she had to do something about warning her family. She cursed herself for not having her phone on her person (why didn’t dresses have pockets?). It would have been so easy to shoot Matt a text, but she came up with an idea that would only have her parted from Lance for a moment.

She looked around as if she would find Lotor over her shoulder and saw the ballroom was still empty. Leaving her heels there, she rushed out and to the front desk, forcing herself to look as pleasant and casual as possible.

“Can I get some food delivered to room 417?”

“Certainly, what would you like?” The receptionist handed over a laminated menu to her. Pidge didn’t really care what the food was, she just wanted someone else to be near their suite so there would be less likelihood of an attack. She pretended to look over the menu for a bit to not seem too suspicious.

“How about a cheese platter and some macaroni salad? Ooh, and some breadsticks, please. Thank you!” She handed the menu back and walked quickly back to the ballroom, letting out a sigh of relief when she saw Lance was still lying where she left him. She hoped the cheese platter would be enough of an indicator to Matt to have his guard up. Without Lance, they had no kind of defense against a ghost attack.

And Lance was still unresponsive.

She held his hand a little tighter, hoping to elicit some kind of response. She placed the back of her hand against his forehead to find his temperature was fine. He wasn’t showing any signs of pain or illness so she had to wonder if something was injured on the ghost side of things, therefore affecting his human form. Her mind wandered to the worst-case scenarios, wondering if he was in a coma or slowly dying.

“You can’t give up on me now, you goofball,” she said with a forced laugh, trying to hold back her tears. “I haven’t even experimented on you with a blacklight yet. I haven’t even… I’ve never told you…” She let out a heavy exhale, closing her eyes and feeling the emotion pool up behind her lids. She couldn’t bring herself to say it…

How she had loved him for quite some time now.

She slumped in defeat as she waited for a sign she dreaded would never come. His hand still remained limp, but his breathing and pulse were steady, albeit weak. After a long time of doubt and fear eating away at her heart, his hand finally twitched within hers.

She quickly wiped away the tears as she leaned a little closer to watch his eyes flutter open, a look of exhausted confusion upon his face. When his blue eyes finally met hers, one of his eyebrows raised.

“Why are you crying?”

Pidge groaned. “I thought you were _dying_ , that’s why!!”

“Technically already did that.”

She sighed but gave him a big smile of relief. “An anomalous autonomy.”

He chuckled weakly. “You’ve finally said it.”

“Yeah, because you, Hunk, and now Matt won’t shut up about it. Do you think you can stand? There’s a cheese platter waiting for you in our suite.”

His eyes widened in excitement. “You mean a _fancy_ cheese platter. There’s a big difference.”

She gave him a look. “And there’s also breadsticks which were the closest thing to garlic knots on the menu.”

“What would I do without you, Pidge?”

“Probably die.”

“Already did that.”

“Because I wasn’t there.”

“Touché.”

“Come on,” she encouraged, standing up and bending over to try and help lift him onto his feet. With some effort he was able to stand, but leaned on her for support with an arm around her shoulders. She awkwardly twisted her feet back into her heels and wrapped an arm around his waist. “Alright, you ready? There’s an elevator not far. Just act drunk if anyone approaches us.”

“Oooh, I can do that. I’m pretty confident this is how it feels to be wasted.”

“Oh, and you’re 21 if anyone asks, not 19.”

“You are so smart.” He grinned like an idiot. 

“And you are so wasted,” she said, looking up at him with a mix of concern and sympathy in her reddened eyes. “I’m glad you’re alright. We’ll figure out a way to heal you, I promise.”

He let out a sound that was a mix between a sigh and a scoff. “It’s okay if you can’t, Pidge, don’t make any promises you can’t keep that you’ll end up beating yourself up over later on.” He reckoned there’d be no cure for his condition and he’d have to simply suffer through it until he got better, and he knew Pidge would feel responsible for being powerless to help him. He didn’t want her to ever feel that way for his sake. “I’d happily get beaten up by an angry millionaire half-ghost again if it meant keeping your family safe.”

Pidge was quiet a moment as they slowly made their way out of the ballroom. “I think that’s the nicest thing anyone has ever said to me.” She wanted to tell him what she couldn’t say even when he was unconscious, but her throat grew tight and her tongue felt heavy. Instead, all she could muster in a softly spoken voice was…

“Thank you…”


	6. Shades of Gray

While the gala brought many concerns to light, Lance was feeling more confused than anything. In his fight with Lotor he remained intangible the whole time but was still somehow injured. It felt like his entire body was bruised and the aching lasted for days. He couldn’t go ghost for two days after the incident and he didn’t know why.

“Hank said it was probably some kind of roadblock in my mind,” Lance explained as he slumped down on the couch.

“How did you go about telling him about your ghost problems without telling him about your ghost problems?” Hunk asked, not looking up from his textbook.

“I kinda worded it as… like how I feel as if I’m not able to do things I normally enjoy doing.”

“Sounds like depression,” Pidge interjected.

Lance groaned. “Now you sound like my mom.”

“No but really,” Hunk said, “what did he say about the road blocks?”

“He said it was probably some kind of distraction - and it could be a good or bad one - that’s occupying my mind. And,” Lance flailed his arms in frustration. “I mean there’s a _lot of freaking things_ that could classify as a _distraction_ right now.”

“Well…” Hunk pursed his lips together in thought. “What did my dad say about getting rid of said distractions? Maybe you can at least eliminate a few of them.”

“Ugh, now you’re sounding like him.” Lance moaned as he threw his head back against the couch and closed his eyes. “I don’t need _two_ therapists in my life.”

“Lance, hold out your arm,” Pidge instructed as she prepped some kind of instrument that hummed to life.

“And I certainly don’t need to be experimented on by _three_ people.” He gave Pidge a dirty look but held out his arm for her regardless.

“I’m just checking something,” she defended. “I’ll be done in a shake.”

Lance mouthed the word “shake” to Hunk with an invisible question mark and he gave a frown and shrug in response. He returned his attention to Pidge. “So your parents still haven’t heard anything from Lotor?”

She didn’t look up from her device but paused a moment as a heavy exhale left her nose. “No. And that… actually worries me more.”

“Where does this guy live?” Hunk asked. “You saw him in Boston but he doesn’t actually live here, does he?”

“I know he has multiple mansions,” Pidge scoffed. “I’m sure he’s got one that’s closer to us than Boston.”

“So that means you’d have at least _some_ warning before he arrived here. It’s not like he lives up the street.”

“He’s a _ghost_ , Hunk,” Lance said. “He could get here pretty quickly if he wanted to.” When Pidge’s device started beeping, he looked at her with wide eyes. “Whatdoesthatmean?”

She didn’t respond for a moment but only frowned at the mechanism as it hovered over his hand. When Lance whined her name, she looked up at him with a tired expression. “It’s just sensing you have more ectoplasm in your hands. Which makes sense, considering that’s where you shoot your ghost rays.”

“Oh.” He slowly lowered his arm now that it appeared she was finished, grasping his wrist with his other hand and nervously ringing it as if he needed to give the ectoplasm better circulation within his bloodstream. “I still don’t understand how I can have normal human blood but you can detect ghost blood.”

“There’s a lot I still don’t understand about you,” Pidge replied simply.

 _You’re verrrry hard to understand,_ Plachu said from where he sat on the coffee table. _I’m pretty sure your kind shouldn’t exist._

“Thanks for that,” Lance said flatly. When Pidge looked up at him with raised eyebrows, he quickly added, “Not you, I was talking to the rat.”

“Oh gosh, sometimes I forget they’re there,” Hunk exclaimed with a slight jump.

Pidge rolled her eyes and left the room to go get something from one of the laboratories and Hunk took this as an opportunity to lean in towards Lance with wiggling eyebrows. 

"So~" he said with a coy smirk. "When are you going to move up from science experiment to _lab partners?"_

Lance flushed a bright red. "W-what? Pidge and I are just friends, Hunk!"

He looked at him with raised brows, eyes narrowed skeptically. He returned his attention to his textbook, grumbling an unconvinced "Suuuure."

* * *

“A teleporting wolf??”

Lance thought he had already seen all the bizarre ghosts imaginable. It was troublesome enough to have a wolf that could turn intangible and invisible and shoot ghost rays from its mouth, but to have it teleport as well was making Lance’s head spin.

“Yeah it’s currently heading towards the Smythe Tech,” Pidge informed him as she watched the ghost’s dot moving on her radar, occasionally disappearing and reappearing somewhere nearby. “But it doesn’t seem like it can teleport too far.”

“Still… it’s like Keith in canine form.”

When Lance arrived at the I.T. lab, the whole building was in chaos. He kept himself invisible as he made his way around (and sometimes through) employees as they scrambled to backup and shut down their systems. The lights were going haywire, sparks flying from various electrical devices. Before Lance became a ghost he would have been terrified (and was still admittedly a bit scared) because the atmosphere fit the stereotypical poltergeist horror film. Even the electric doors were opening and closing on their own.

He used his ghost vision to try and pinpoint the wolf but it kept teleporting before he could get any closer. As soon as he entered a room to find it chewing on some wires, it would disappear in a sparkly flash. He found an empty room, made himself human, and pulled out his phone to call Pidge.

“Okay, first of all, that is NOT a wolf.”

“What is it then?” He could hear her typing in the background. “The ectoplasm signature reading looked like the silhouette of a wolf.” 

“Yeah, it’s like the size of a… of a… it’s really freaking huge, okay? Every time I get close it bolts. What am I supposed to do??”

Matt’s voice butted into the phone conversation. “Have you tried playing fetch with it?”

“I’m being serious here!”

“So am I! If it’s destroying things it probably wants to play.”

“Huh,” Pidge said, “You know you might be on to something. When Bae Bae was a puppy she would get into trouble if we went too long without playing with her.”

“This wolf ain’t no puppy.”

“How would you know?” Matt asked. “Maybe its final form is even _bigger.”_

Lance hung up, letting out a sigh as he went ghost again and tried to find something he could use to play fetch. “’Gee Pidge, I’m dealing with a giant canine I can’t catch, what should I do?’ ‘Oh play some fetch with it like it’s a friendly golden retriever! I’m sure it won’t try to kill you!’” He mimicked Pidge’s voice at a higher octave, finally deciding on a power strip as a lousy form of a stick, twirling it around as he continued to murmur to himself. “Why can’t you invent some kind of ghost vacuum where I can just suck them all to me and trap them away?”

When he turned around to leave the room he let out a shriek. The wolf was blocking the doorway, its massive black and electric blue body filling the doorframe. Its bright yellow eyes stared intently at the power strip in Lance’s hand.

He remembered to breathe, taking a sharp inhale as he kept vigilant eye contact. _Are wolves a predator you’re supposed to keep eye contact with? Or is that signaling a challenge?_ Lance couldn’t remember to save his life, and right now he needed it to save his life very badly.

With a pathetic exclamation, he chucked the power strip but didn’t account for the fact that they were in an office room. The wolf watched it hit the wall and fall to the floor, stared at it for a moment longer, then pointed its muzzle back to Lance.

After a stretch of mutual silence, Lance let out a groan. “What? Why are you destroying things?”

The wolf slowly blinked.

“Are you gonna- oh _great.”_ The wolf teleported with a blinding flash, leaving Lance back where he started. Either the wolf couldn’t talk or chose not to talk to him and continued to wreak havoc in the building instead. “At least he didn’t try to kill me.”

Considering most of the ghosts he dealt with lately? Having the giant wolf ghost be either a neutral, possibly friendly party was a win in Lance’s book.

He turned human again and fished out his phone. “Wolf can’t fetch,” he said to Pidge as soon as he heard the connection.

“You’re not dead,” she greeted.

“ _Technically speaking,”_ he said with a snicker, “But speaking of tech, the whole building is fried. It’s like the wolf enjoys eating power cords. I think the electricity is what gives him the ability to teleport, so he’s sucking the building dry. Or something. Any suggestions?”

“Oh. Clever connection. Maybe try powering down the whole building?”

I’ve seen him absorb electricity from things that aren’t powered, so I don’t think that’ll help much at this point...”

“Hmm… call Keith?”

Lance groaned as obnoxiously as he could. “You know I hate Keith!! He’d probably come waltzing in, _conveniently_ be a giant wolf whisperer and become best friends with the thing on the spot. And I’d look like an idiot. Again. Oh and he’d probably pull a ‘gee Lance, don’tyaknow you can do this stupidly easy thing as a ghost which would instantly solve your problem?’” 

“At least you’re learning stuff from him?”

“In the most embarrassing, demeaning way possible.”

Pidge made an unconvincing sound. “Just let him help you.”

“No!” he yelled down into the phone and irately hung up. He had a strong yearning to prove to her he wasn’t the incapable idiot that he was certain she believed him to be, and calling Keith to help him would be like admitting defeat. He felt dumb enough as it was from accidentally turning himself ghost in the Holt’s alternate dimension portal, the least he could do was show Pidge that he was adaptable and could do something somewhat impressive all on his own.

A looming dread that he wouldn’t be able to protect her or her family from Lotor still remained and that anxiety was slowly eating away at his confidence. The least he could do was take care of this ghost wolf without anyone else’s help. If he couldn’t take care of one mischievous canine there was no hope of him keeping Pidge safe.

Despite his many efforts, the wolf eventually teleported away, presumably back to the ghost realm, and Lance was left in the wake of a completely damaged building with a completely wrecked heart.

* * *

Lance slowly made his way home by means of walking even though he could have gone ghost and traveled there much faster. He didn’t have the strength to call Pidge so he sent her a text.

_Wolf ran off. I’m going to head on home. I’m sorry._

_You sure? It’s only 7.  
_ _We could play some video games if you’d like. We don’t have to study._

_I think I need to just go home.  
_ _Sorry for being so annoying tonight._

_Invitation is always open.  
_ _You’re fine Lance. Please stop stressing._

_I’ll try._

_See you tomorrow?_

_See you tomorrow._

He was ready to flop on his bed and lay there without even taking off his shoes but Veronica opened the front door to let him in as if she were expecting him.

“Hey,” he greeted hesitantly. If she was there before he could reach the top step he figured he had to be in some kind of trouble.

“We need to talk,” she said ominously, her expression unreadable.

Lance swallowed hard. “’Bout… what, exactly?”

She closed the door behind her and started to walk towards the sidewalk along the street. “Let’s go for a walk.”

Not only did she say the infamous _‘we need to talk’_ opening statement but now she wanted to talk _away_ from the rest of their family. He regularly felt chills down his spine from his nearby ghosts but somehow this felt more unnerving to him. He felt awkward asking again what they were going to talk about so he waited for Veronica to make the first move. She waited until they were about a block from the house.

“So when did you become a ghost?”

Lance felt his stomach launch into his throat. He couldn’t beat around the bush or lie to Veronica, she was too smart for that. He let out a shaky exhale to try and release some of the tension in his shoulders but it did little to ease his anxiety. “About two months ago? Y-you’re not going to tell mom and dad, are you?”

“Oh god no, I don’t want you to die.”

“Should I be reassured you won’t tell or worried that you also think they would try to kill me if they ever found out?”

“I’m not sure how they’d react, but I think for now it’s safer for you if they don’t know,” she said with a sympathetic frown. “They might try unconventional solutions in an attempt to… ‘cure’ you, and while they’d have all the best intentions, they could accidentally cause more harm than good.”

“That’s true,” he agreed, feeling slightly bad for assuming his parents would immediately come after him with the intent to destroy. But he remembered his mother talking about doppelganger ghosts at one point so it wasn’t a stretch to worry that she would see him as an imposter ghost instead of her own son. “How did you figure it out, anyways?”

“Quite a number of things, actually. But it was easy - you were on TV.”

“I _what??”_

“Smythe Tech was on the news and it showed the Phantom Paladin chasing some giant wolf ghost. While I had my suspicions that the Phantom Paladin looked a lot like you but never considered that could even be _possible_ , what convinced me was a habitual tick you did on the TV footage. Plus, you came home incredibly tired right after the incident occurred.”

“What habitual tick?”

“You said ‘oh cheese.’ No one says that but you, Lance.”

“ _Oh._ ” He swallowed hard. “Do you think anyone else is suspicious?” he asked in regards to their parents and siblings.

“I’m the only one who pays attention to the news, aside from dad on occasion. So I think you’re fine.” She stopped walking so she could properly look at him. “I’ll do what I can to keep this all a secret, but you do realize you’re going to have to tell them all eventually, right?”

He let out a deep sigh, feeling some of the tension gone now that Veronica promised to help him. “Yeah, I know… I just… don’t know how to bring up ‘hey fam, I’m now the thing you’re all scared of’ without it ending horribly.” He lowered his eyebrows skeptically. “Aren’t _you_ scared?”

“Not particularly. I’ve always known ghosts were real but I also discovered from an early age that they’re not all malicious like mom and dad make them out to be.” She shrugged one shoulder. “I’ll be thinking of ways we could approach them about your… condition. But for now, try not to get killed out there, okay? You can always come to me if you’re having any problems.”

Lance gave her a bittersweet smile, pulling her in for a hug. “Thanks, Veronica. Really.”

“You’re welcome. But know this, you owe me _all_ the details about how all of this happened. On a night you’re not ready to pass out, that is.”

He groaned, pulling away from the embrace as they started to head back to the house. “Is it that obvious?”

“You look like the walking dead, Lance. Which is now rather accurate, in perspective.”

“Some days I want to just walk through the wall of my room to get to my bed faster, but I can’t do that for obvious reasons.”

“Yeah, probably a good idea to _not_ do that,” she said with a laugh.

“Good in theory, bad in practice.” 


	7. Be There in Spirit

_Veronica now knows everything._  
_Still no sign from Lotor. I think he’s purposely drawing out the suspense and then he’ll attack when I least expect it._  
_And thus the hunter becomes the hunted._  
_Although I’ve never been much of a ghost hunter._  
_Ghost buster, maybe?_  
_And thus the buster becomes the busted._  
_That sounds stupid._  
_And thus Lance dies. Again. For real this time._  
_That sounds stupid too._  
_Ghost wolf also completely ruined my crush’s life, so that’s great._  
_Allura’s godfather lost his job and it seems that’s the only thing anyone cares to talk about, along with how the Paladin Ghost royally screwed up. Apparently everyone saw me on TV.  
_ _Not exactly the way I imagined being famous._

Lance and Hunk were attempting to relax and have a good time but duty rang for the eight thousandth time when Lance had to leave and take care of another troublesome ghost. By the time he returned, Hunk had finished his ice cream and he had a bowl of chocolate strawberry soup. He slumped down into the booth seat with a sigh, looking down at his melted ice cream as if it were some kind of unfortunate sign from the universe.

“Perks of being a ghost: invisibility. Cons of being a ghost: I can’t have nice things.”

“I can buy you another one,” Hunk offered. “Really, I don’t mind.”

“Eh, it’s okay. I’m just being dramatic.”

“ _Wait.”_ Hunk’s tone was so dramatic that it caused Lance’s shoulders to jump, his eyes wide. Hunk leaned in close to whisper with a grin on his face. “What if you use your _ice_ powers to freeze it back?”

“Ohhh.” Lance grabbed his chin as he thought about it for a moment, looking around the parlor to see if anyone was watching. He moved his hands to wrap around the sides of his dish, still eyeing other customers as his hands turned slightly translucent.

“You know, being like that you look like you’re paranoid someone’s going to snatch your melted ice cream,” Hunk observed. “No one’s going to notice, just relax.”

Lance let out a low growl but looked down at his ice cream to see it was slowly solidifying. “It’s workinggggg~” 

“See, you can have nice things. Sometimes you just gotta work for them.”

Lance looked up at him with a sour expression. “Stop sounding like your father.”

Hunk innocently held up his hands with a frown. “So. When are you going to be a man and ask Allura on a date?”

Lance had just scooped a spoonful into his mouth and nearly choked on it. “Wait- what?!”

“You’ve been moping all day about how you ruined her life. If you like her so much, how about you make it up to her by finally finding the guts to ask her out?”

“I-“ Lance worked his mouth open and closed a few times before letting out a sigh of defeat. “I think she’s way out of my league.”

“Everyone who has ever said that is trying to justify the fact they are merely a coward.”

He narrowed his eyes at him, taking a skeptical bite of his ice cream. “Who are you quoting?”

“No one,” he answered irritably. “Come on man, the worst that could happen is she says no, and you go home no longer wondering if she’d ever say yes and regretting that you never had a spine to find out. But she’ll probably say yes and you’ll probably have an enjoyable time. So just. Do. It.”

“FINE! Fine. I’ll ask her out tonight.”

Hunk looked like he couldn’t be happier.

Since when was his best friend his matchmaker?

* * *

If Lance was nervous about asking out the most popular girl at school, the fact she lived in a decked-out mansion wasn’t helping. The Holts were just as rich but their house looked relatively normal from the outside. The Altea residence looked like the dwelling of a celebrity, and it took him a solid five-minute walk from the beginning of their driveway to the front door.

He rapped the golden lion door knocker against the deep mahogany wood and stood there wondering if this was a good idea or if he was only doing this to appease Hunk. After everything that happened, Allura might find his invite as nothing more than a nuisance. Before he could overthink things any more than he already had, a blonde servant girl answered the door.

“Hello!”

“Hi, umm… is Allura home?”

“Oh yes, let me go get her!” she said in a bubbly tone, closing the door on him.

Lance frowned but heard voices from within getting louder as they approached the entrance. He could hear Allura saying “Romelle, you have to invite the guests _in,_ you don’t shut the door on them.” The door swung back open and Allura raised her eyebrows at the sight of her guest. Her dark brown hair which was normally tied back in a massive bun was loose and wavy around her shoulders.

“Lonce?”

“Heyyy…” He cleared his throat awkwardly, realizing he had no plan on how to go from greeting her to asking her out. He certainly couldn’t _open_ with that, so he settled for a casual, “How are doing?”

Her bright blue eyes softened. He was the only one of her classmates to check up on her after everything that had happened. She always thought Lance was a bit of an annoyance but she saw he was being sincere.

“Why don’t you come inside? I’ve made some delicious hibiscus tea.”

Lance smiled, feeling the butterflies in his stomach begin to relax. “That sounds lovely.” 

* * *

The date turned out to be anything but lovely.

Everything was going swimmingly until Sendak decided to show up in the middle of their stroll through the park. During their chat the other day, Lance learned that Allura vehemently hated the Phantom Paladin and blamed him for being incapable of catching the wolf ghost that destroyed her godfather Coran’s company, lost his job, and ruined his reputation. Now that Sendak was here, calling Lance by name and shooting ghost rays at him and his date, he had no choice but to reveal the irony to Allura.

Her eyes widened when she saw his hair go white and his eyes burn green. “Y- _you!”_

“Surprise?” Lance lifted his hands as hovered in the air. “Look, I’m really sor-“

Before he could apologize, Allura had pulled a gun on him from somewhere beneath her dress. He narrowly dodged a ghost ray to his face but in his distraction got whacked by Sendak’s mechanical arm with a pained yelp.

Lance aimed icy rays at Sendak’s arm and made a conscious effort to avoid hitting Allura while also dodging her attacks. While Sendak was a powerful nuisance, he wasn’t much of a threat anymore now that Lance could freeze his mechanical arm. Once he eliminated his weaponry he just had to keep a safe distance.

“Where did you even _get_ a ghost gun??” Last he checked the Holts were the only ones who knew how to make those – in addition to Hunk.

“From a sympathizer!!” She let out a growl of frustration as Lance continually evaded her attacks or turned intangible to her rays. “Was anything you said even true?? Or did you ask me out so you could feel better about yourself?!”

As Lance continued to fight Sendak and avoid Allura he was starting to get tired, each attack becoming increasingly closer as his reflexes slowed. “Can we _please_ have this conversation later?!”

“No, we’re going to have it right now! Did you even _try_ to stop that wolf?!”

“Yes!! I tried very very hard! And I _did_ ask you out because I wanted to cheer you up, not because I felt I _had_ to! And I _do_ really like you, okay?!”

“Aww, so precious,” Sendak contributed mockingly. “Are you going to propose or can we get back to me pummeling you?”

Lance narrowed his eyes at him and blasted more ice rays in his direction, but Sendak was fast, skirting around the frosted blue beams and sending Lance flying. Shortly after, one of Allura’s rays hit him as well, sending him even further. Once he regained his “footing” as he hovered in the air, he wiped some blood from his mouth and charged back into the fight.

“A nice date isn’t enough to make up for what you’ve done, Lance,” Allura warned. “Not when you’ve ruined everything for the only one I can call family!”

“I know that, I just-!” He groaned in frustration as he tried to keep his head in the fight but also reason with his date that his apology was genuine. As Sendak delivered another blow to his face he was starting to think he’d fail at both objectives. Sharp pains traveled down his spine and he realized it was his old injury from the school starting to flare up again. When the next blast from Sendak cast stars in his vision he knew he wouldn’t last much longer.

The sound of a familiar motorcycle revved across the grass, stopping on the outskirts of the fight. Veronica pulled something out of her purse and started aiming the long cannister. “Looks like you could use some help!” 

“Wha-?” Lance turned around to see his sister aiming to shoot something at Sendak but Allura took his surprise as an opportunity to blast him square in the chest, Veronica simultaneously pushing the trigger on the thermos within her hands to produce a blinding ray of electric blue. The hit from Allura pushed Lance back just far enough.

“Oh _crap.”_ Veronica’s eyes widened as her brother was accidentally sucked into the thermos, the lid clasping shut with a poof of ghostly smoke. She looked up to see Sendak and Allura staring at her with a mix of bewilderment and irritation.

“VERONICAAAAA!” Lance shrieked from within the thermos, his voice distorted and echoing.

Both ghost hunters started to make a move towards her so she revved the engine on her motorcycle and booked it out of the park, affording to steal a few glances as she sped through the streets to make sure they didn’t follow. She knew she could outrun Allura but she was worried about the massive pointy-eared ghost.

“I _swear_ if this thing eats me or you can’t get me out of here, I will actually be a stereotypical ghost and haunt you for the rest of eternity!!”

Veronica scoffed, although she was inwardly relieved to hear his voice inside the tube poking out of her satchel. “You’re _welcome,_ by the way.”

“You’re welcome?! YOU’RE WELCOME?!!!”

“I just saved you from two ghost hunters! And don’t you dare tell me you were ‘handling it’ because you were definitely not ‘handling it.’”

“I was on a daaaate!!” he whined. “It threw me off guard.”

“Wait, Allura was your date?” She turned down various backroads to take an alternate route so if the ghost hunter went straight to the Holt house he wouldn’t find them there for a while. “She was shooting at you.”

“… we may have our differences.”

“Clearly.”

They bickered the rest of the ride as Veronica continued her detour. She even stopped at a drive-thru (much to Lance’s annoyance) to get a late-night snack (she argued that she got some mozzarella sticks for him once they figured out how to release him). There were no signs of any ghosts as she drove towards the Holt house and pulled into their driveway. As a precaution, she moved her bike to the side of the house where it was better hidden.

As soon as Pidge let her inside, Veronica pulled out the thermos and held it out to her horizontally as if it were a sword. “So we have a dilemma.”

Her eyes lit up with excitement. “Oh you caught a ghost??”

“YEAH, SHE SURE DID,” Lance quipped.

As Pidge’s hands grasped both ends of the thermos her face fell. “ _Oh….yikes.”_

He let out a nervous giggle. “You’re just saying yikes because this is a really crummy situation to be stuck in – ha, pun – not because the smartest girl I know doesn’t know how to get me out of here, right??”

Pidge bit her lip as she grimaced at Veronica, her face reflecting the same. “We haven’t worked out the details on how to release ghosts from the thermoses yet.”

Lance screamed so loud it caused Pidge to drop him, but she quickly picked the tube back up, apologetically stroking it as if that would help.

“NoooOoooOOooo, _Piiiiiiiidge,”_ he cried. “I can’t be stuck in here I’m getting so claustrophobiiiiiic!! AND THERE’S MOZZARELLA STICKS WITH MY NAME ON THEMMMM!”

“Have you tried making yourself intangible?” she asked calmly.

“YES, I tried that the second I got stuck in here! I can’t even change my legs into a tail to be more comfortable!”

“How did this even happen?” Pidge asked with a skeptical frown at his sister. “I thought you had to have good aim to be in the Air Force.”

Veronica sighed. “My aim was _perfect_ ; his freaking girlfriend had to intervene and shoot him into my shot.”

“His _what?”_

“She’s not my girlfriend!” Lance piped up. “Yet.”

“YET?” Pidge looked ready to chuck the thermos out the window, her knuckles turning white. “Well, serves you right.”

“How does that serve me right?! I took Allura on a perfectly nice date, thank you very much!” He lowered his voice to a whisper and with the echoing effect it was rather unnerving. “And _she_ even admitted it was a ‘nice’ date, so that’s a win in my books.”

“Everything in your books could fit on a paper airplane,” Pidge spat.

“ _Ouch._ You know Pidge, if you’d let me, I could give you dating advice so you could actually be happy on a date with a guy like Hunk or Ryan or James or I dunno, someone smart.”

“I don’t care about _that_ , you _idiot!!”_

When Pidge saw Veronica’s fascinated expression she realized she had said too much. In an attempt to cover up her own mess, she started angrily twisting the cap to the thermos. “There’s gotta – be a way – uuuuugh! – to open this!”

“I already tried that on the way here,” Veronica said. “The thing won’t budge.”

Pidge groaned. “Care to give us an insider, Lance? Anything on your end that could help us get you out?”

“I don’t know, let me unfold my paper airplane,” he said bitterly.

She looked down at the thermos with troubled eyes, her shoulders drooping heavily. “Let’s see what the parentals have to say,” she offered with no enthusiasm in her tone.

When Pidge and Veronica reached the lab, they explained the situation to Sam and Colleen with Matt also joining out of curiosity. Lance was oddly quiet the whole time and it was starting to worry Pidge.

“Since Lance is also human,” Colleen started, “perhaps there’s something we could use to our advantage.”

“What if Lance just… turned human?” Matt suggested.

“While _in_ the thermos??” Pidge looked horrified.

“Yeah nononono we’re not ‘trying’ that,” Lance declared.

“What if you changing breaks it open though?” Matt asked.

“Sounds too painful.”

“No, Lance is right,” Sam said, “we need to try a different approach. What if…” He held his chin in thought, his lips twisted into a pensive frown. “The thermos is designed to reflect and bounce ectoplasm, so ghosts can’t destroy it from outside or from within. But Lance is also capable of creating ice rays.”

“His ice rays technically still produce ectoplasm though,” Pidge countered.

“Yes, but it’s still significantly less than his normal attacks.”

“I don’t like where this is going,” Lance whined. “If I have to attack it from the inside out, and my ice rays have ectoplasm, that means it’s still going to bounce off the walls in here. There’s not exactly any space for them to do that.”

“Well, would you rather free yourself by hurting yourself a bit and being really cold,” Matt began, “or hurt yourself a _lot_ and possibly breaking something in half like your spinal cord? Attacking the walls and turning human are the only solutions we’ve got.”

“I’m sure we could invent something to safely extract him but that could take days,” Colleen offered, her tone sympathetic. She looked to Veronica. “And I’m certain your family will become worried if he’s missing that long.”

“Yeah… we can’t exactly make up that he went to boot camp or something,” Veronica mused. “I could at least vouch for him tonight and say he stayed over here studying, but he needs to make a physical appearance at home by tomorrow night.”

“We could at least try to come up with something within that time frame,” Colleen said, moving her eyes to the thermos. “Unless Lance would like to try blasting the thermos from within.”

“Hmm, not particularly, no,” he answered. “But I uhm…” His tone changed, sounding more scared than Pidge had ever heard him. “I’m really not liking it in here, I don’t know how much longer I can handle being cramped like this.”

“We’ll work as quickly as we can,” Sam promised.

* * *

Veronica bid the Holts (and Lance) goodnight and left the mozzarella sticks with Pidge while Sam and Colleen slaved away at their computers and lab equipment to find a solution for Lance. Pidge wanted to help her parents but her mother softly commanded her to stay with Lance and take him out to the living room. While he desperately needed an anchor at this time, Pidge had a lot of conflicting emotions regarding him right now and she wasn’t confident in her ability to be his emotional landline.

She was still annoyed at his obvious crush on Allura (and was there a hint of jealousy? He sounded so happy about the date, why couldn’t she make him happy like that?), frustrated at how terribly dense he was, mad at herself for making light of his intelligence when he clearly thought that was all she was interested in, and worried about his current situation. She wasn’t sure how to process all of those feelings while also trying to comfort him through the panic when she was just as terrified for his well being. She would normally opt for holding his hand or giving him a hug but she couldn’t do that when he was cramped inside a tube.

“I’m sorry,” she said softly.

“It’s not your fault, it just kinda happened.” Even though he tried to sound calm she could tell his voice was shaking. “And it’s not Veronica’s fault either. It just… it sucks.”

“No, I’m apologizing for the things I said,” she clarified with a heavy pause. “I shouldn’t have said them, I’m sorry.”

Lance was quiet for a long moment so she continued. “You know you’re smarter than you think you are, Lance. Being good at calculus or understanding science aren’t the only measures of intelligence. There is so much more to you that gives you worth. And… I know it’s cheesy and said a million times by people in movies, but… you matter to me. You’re my friend… my _best_ friend… and I – I don’t want you to ever think that you’re not good enough, because you’re perfectly good enough to me.”

His voice cracked as he tried to speak up. “C-can you please remember all of that and tell it to me again later? I caught most of it but I’m-“ He paused again and as Pidge listened more carefully she could tell he was breathing fast and heavy. “I don’t know- I don’t know how much- much longer I can last in here.”

“Okay, Lance? Breathe.” She carefully took the thermos from her lap and held it up in front of her face so he could better hear her. “Come on, breathe with me. Deep inhale.” She slowly took in a breath for four seconds. “Slowly exhale.” They breathed slowly together for a few minutes until Pidge felt he was good to move on to the next step.

“Okay, what’s eight times five?”

“Wait- what?”

“Math will serve as a distraction,” she explained. “You’re good at basic math so let’s run through some equations together. Eight times five.”

“Forty-five.”

“Ninety-eight divided by seven.”

“…fourteen.”

“Nineteen times six.”

“…one hundred and… fourteen.”

Pidge smiled, glad to see he was calmly solving equations and his voice slowly began to lose its tremor. When she was satisfied that they had done enough for now, she said to him warmly, “See? You’re smart, Lance. Most people struggle to do basic math that quickly.”

“Really? It seems pretty easy to me.”

“That’s because you’re smart.”

“If you say so,” he said, but she could hear the smile in his voice.

“I know so.”

A peaceful moment of silence passed between them and Pidge allowed herself to close her eyes and rest, hoping Lance could try to do the same. She still felt the fire from her battling emotions still raging inside her but she was somehow alright with it continuing to burn in her chest. Whether it was acceptance or hope that things could be better she wasn’t sure. She was still annoyed and frustrated with Lance but the pain had dissipated. Who he dated was his prerogative and if she wanted him to be with her, perhaps she only needed to try a little harder.

“Hey Pidge?”

His voice stirred her from her thoughts, her eyes blinking open even though she couldn’t exactly look at him. “Yeah?”

“I’m sorry I’ve been such a pain.”

“What?” It was like he had read her thoughts and now she was wondering if the ghost mice weren’t exaggerating when they said that was a ghostly ability.

“I feel like I’m such a mess and I’m always screwing up on everything, and you’re always there to help me and how do I thank you? I usually yell at you and that’s… you said earlier that I was your best friend and if that’s so, then I’ve been a pretty crummy best friend lately. I feel awful about that.”

“Lance, it’s okay-“

“No it’s not okay! And here I am being the world’s biggest hypocrite, taking Allura out on a nice date to try and make her happy and make it up to her for ruining her life, but meanwhile I am ruining your life on a daily basis and I don’t do anything nice for you. Well… I let you run experiments on me. Out of the goodness of my heart, let me tell ya, I hate all the things you test on me. But that aside… I need to start owning up to the best friend status. If I ever get out of this thing, I’ll make it all up to you.”

Pidge stared at the thermos in her lap for a bit, disheartened that she couldn’t reach for his hand. This moment might have been more intimate if he were physically here, but Pidge was starting to get the feeling that she and Lance were two parallel lines – always close but never together.

She wanted to be closer.

She so desperately wanted to be intertwined with him.

Her fingertips ghosted the surface of the thermos, her blue nail polish reminding her of his eyes she wished she could gaze into. She let out a heavy exhale, fully feeling the ache in her chest. They were so far apart but she had to hold on to the hope that things would get better and that the turmoil of emotions in her veins would one day settle. She took his words as a promise and held them close to her heart. She answered him simply, her purple lips forming a sad smile.

“I’d like that.” 


	8. Skeletons in the Closet

Being trapped inside a thermos for five hours did a number on Lance’s mental health. The Holts figured out a way to safely extract him, and in turn that discovery led to them finally completing the alternate dimension portal, much to Lance’s dismay. It had been a few hours since they got him out of the thermos and he still couldn’t revert back into his human form.

“Do you think it could be some kind of roadblock, like Hank was saying?” Pidge asked him as they played Killbot in the living room. Pidge was sitting on the floor in front of the couch while Lance was sitting cross-legged and hovering a foot off the ground next to her. It was three in the morning but Pidge was going to stay up with Lance until he calmed down and figured out how to be human again.

Lance sighed. “There’s probably twenty-six roadblocks I need to get rid of until I can start feeling normal again. Which, I mean, is _never_ going to truly happen. So as ‘normal’ as someone who’s half-ghost can feel, I guess.”

“Being normal is overrated anyways.”

“Easy for you to say, miss oddball,” he said with a playful laugh.

“You are so right, goofball.”

When his character died on the screen, he let out a sigh, setting the controller down on the coffee table in front of them. “At least I’m still solid. Although I could probably play telepathically if I really tried.”

“You mean telekinetically?” she asked as she continued to mash buttons.

“Whichever one involves moving things with my brain.”

“That’s the one.”

“Telekinetically, then,” he said with a nod, folding his arms as he watched Pidge continue on in the game without his avatar. “I think my main issue is that… I’m just _worried.”_

She frowned. “I know it’s dumb to ask ‘worried about what?’ but… what are you most worried about?”

Lance pursed his lips as he tried to evaluate which of the many troubling things clouding his mind was the most worrisome. Despite all his concerns, his mind kept returning to Lotor. “Your family, mostly.”

“ _My_ family? Shouldn’t you be worried about _yours?”_

“I’m worried about Lotor,” he said simply.

“Oh. Yeah…” Pidge had also started to worry about the long stretch of silence since the gala when Lotor harmed Lance. From what little Lance was able to get out of Lotor in their encounter, he was definitely vengeful towards her parents. It had to be only a matter of time before he made a move. “My parents have developed some impressive anti-ghost tech, though… so hopefully if anything does happen, they’ll be prepared.”

Lance laughed dryly. “Yeah I know, my family has practically bought all your parents’ tech. It's been a pain to try and avoid it without giving myself away. But Lotor is also human. And he’s been half-ghost a lot longer than I have and I’m sure there’s a lot more he can do that your parents won’t see coming. I just… I don’t think we can actually _prepare_ to fight him, you know? And I’m scared that I won’t be able to do anything to stop him from hurting you or your family.”

“Lance…” She paused the game and set down her controller, turning to fully face him. “Please don’t take that burden upon yourself. I know you’re a ghost and can therefore fight ghosts better than we can with our limited technology, but if anything happens…” Her eyes fell for a moment, her chest feeling tight. “I don’t want you to feel responsible. You are not my family’s bodyguard, you’re my friend.”

“That’d be like MJ telling Spiderman ‘it’s not your fault if I die even though you have superpowers that could have prevented it.’ How am I supposed to _not_ feel responsible for that kind of thing??”

“I… I don’t know,” she said heavily. “I know you taking on Lotor all by yourself is an impossible feat, though. I don’t want you to feel like you’re the only one who can save my family because at this point… I think if Lotor’s going to do something, there’s not much we can do.”

“There’s gotta be something I can-“

“Lance, it’s _okay_. You can’t keep all this burden on your shoulders – it’s _literally_ keeping you from being human. We’ll address things as they come, but please don’t stress over the what-ifs, okay?”

He was silent for a moment before slowly nodding his head. “Okay.”

She moved up onto her knees so she could pull him into a hug. He held her tight, welcoming the physical contact and the warmth of her body. He felt his knees hit the ground a moment later as he became human again.

Pidge pulled back and held his shoulders as she looked at his familiar blue eyes with a grin. “Hey, you’re back.”

“It’s good to be back,” he agreed with a smile.

* * *

Lance began to notice that there were a lot more ghost attacks than usual and this time they were all targeted specifically to him. There was a particularly dangerous ghost named Zarkon who kept making an appearance and there were additionally more visits from the tenacious Sendak. Lance initially thought it was because the Holts got their portal up and running but they assured him the only time it was on was when they were present and there were no ghosts that entered their realm. Lance eventually learned from Chulatt that there was apparently a million-dollar bounty on his head. Even though the mouse had no idea who issued it, he knew it had to be Lotor’s doing.

If Lotor put a bounty on his head that could only mean one thing.

He was eliminating the only one standing between him and the Holts.

“Perhaps we should try laying low for a while,” Keith suggested as he was back to back with Lance, fighting off half a dozen hostile ghosts.

“Where would we even _do_ that?” he asked. “Middle of Texas?”

“Why Texas?”

“Because it’s a big boring desert?” Lance scoffed. “I don’t know! Have any better ideas? Couldn’t the ghosts just follow us to wherever we go anyways?”

Keith didn’t answer for a moment as he cut through a ghost with his ectoplasm blades. “I could try making a portal…”

“No! No no no!” His voice sped up as he blasted ghosts with his ice rays. “We have no idea where we’d end up and if we’d be able to get back here! What if we wind up in the middle of Europe or something?! My parents would want some kind of explanation and we wouldn’t be able to give them one!!”

“How do you plan on defending your home from hordes of ghosts every single night? We can’t stay here so you need to come up with some excuse for leaving for a few days!”

Lance groaned. “Do you like camping?”

“What?”

“Do you like camping? I could say we’re going camping for the weekend.”

“I had to learn how to live on my own for seven years,” Keith answered flatly.

“Great! You love camping, it’s decided.”

When they nearly finished off all the ghosts that were originally chasing Lance, Sendak had to show up with the smuggest grin on his face, his one good eye glowing mischievously. His mechanical arm looked different - the metal looked more polished and the design looked as if he got some kind of upgrade. After all the damage Lance had done to it with his ice, he wasn’t too surprised.

“Well if it isn’t my two favorite prey, waiting to be caught,” he greeted in a far too pleasant tone.

“And thus, the hunter becomes the hunted,” Lance muttered dryly right before he elicited a shriek when Sendak shot a bright green beam at him. He flew out of the way, Keith barely missing it as well. “I HATE BEING HUNTED!”

Sendak’s grin only grew wider as he closed in on the fight. Lance discovered that his ice rays no longer worked on immobilizing Sendak’s arm, which then pummeled him into the ground. Lance let out a weak wheeze, eyes widening as Sendak lifted his arm back. Lance turned intangible to slip through the concrete before Sendak could slam his fist down on him again.

Luckily Keith was there so the two of them could take turns attacking Sendak, otherwise Lance would have been toast with the arm upgrade. But as they both continued to fight the much larger ghost it was becoming apparent they were slowly losing as their injuries increased and Sendak kept throwing punches.

“Got any other plans?” Lance asked heavily after their last plan failed. He let out a wheeze as he barely dodged a blast from the enemy’s arm. 

“Not really,” Keith admitted exhaustively. “You?”

“Teleporting to the middle of Europe sounds nice about now.” Lance let out a terrified scream when the giant ghost wolf suddenly materialized in front of him with a sparkly cyan flash, as if it had read his thoughts. Slightly disturbed by the convenience of him appearing but also incredibly thankful, Lance’s face lit up. “Did you come here to rescue us??!”

The wolf didn’t say anything but instead clamped its mouth over the left arm bracer of Lance’s ghost armor and yanked him over to Keith. The wolf then turned itself intangible, passing its large body through Lance and Keith. Before Lance could properly freak out, the wolf teleported all three of them away.

His screaming manifested when they arrived in the ghost realm and the wolf slipped out of them, giving Lance an unamused look with flattened ears.

“Wow,” Keith mused, “That was convenient.”

“More like _weird!!”_ Lance objected, still rubbing over his torso where the wolf had hovered through his body. “Where are we anyways?”

From the limited glimpses through the Holts' portal that Lance had seen, he could tell this was the ghost realm. It looked fairly similar to Earth save for the obvious factor that the sky was a soft orange, everything was brightly and abnormally colored, and a lot of things had a tendency to glow or have a faint aura. The trees surrounding them had bright pink bark and neon yellow leaves.

“Wait, I know exactly where we are,” Keith said, leading the way through the forest with confident familiarity. The wolf wandered aimlessly about the trees, sniffing the ground.

“Can humans survive in the ghost realm?” Lance asked, remaining still despite Keith moving further away.

He stopped and turned to face him, shifting to his human form as an answer. “Yeah, it’s fine. Stop being so scared.”

Lance scoffed, changing himself to be human and landing on the dirt with a soft thud. He figured he’d be less recognizable (at least to ghosts) this way. “I have every right to be scared! I’ve never been here and there’s a billion ghosts wanting my million-dollar reward!”

“Well we’re heading to a safe place, so stop worrying.”

Lance let out a deep exhale and followed Keith deeper into the woods, wondering if the wolf could read minds since he could somehow sense Lance wanting to leave the fight with Sendak and apparently teleported them to somewhere safe and familiar to Keith. It was too many coincidences for one day, he decided.

They eventually reached a small cabin that looked plain even by Earth standards. Keith walked right on up to the porch and knocked on the door. Lance wasn’t sure what he was expecting but it certainly wasn’t the tall woman who answered, who looked exactly like Keith in his ghost form.

“Keith!” She leaned a little bit to the side to look at Lance. “And you’ve brought a friend.” She moved her yellow and purple eyes out towards the distance where the wolf still wandered around, sniffing the fallen leaves. “Two friends.”

“Mom, this is Lance,” Keith said as he did the introductory gestures, “Lance, this is my mother, Krolia. And… we don’t really know the wolf’s name. He hasn’t told me it yet.”

Lance deadpanned. “He can’t talk, Keith.”

“All ghosts can talk,” Krolia said with a frown. “He must be shy. Or… a silent type.”

“Sounds like some ghost I know,” Lance muttered.

Krolia allowed them into her humble home, which was incredibly quaint and cozy despite its size. The wolf stayed outside, running around the trees and letting out the occasional bark. Keith and Lance explained how Lance was half-ghost and their current situation, ultimately deciding to stay the night. Lance oddly enough received cell service in the ghost realm, and although his call to Veronica was choppy at best, he was able to text her perfectly fine. He told her to tell their parents that he was camping with Keith and he'd be back home sometime at the end of the weekend. He then opened up his text conversation with Pidge and sent her a message:

_Keith and I are going to stay at his mom’s house in the ghost realm. Text me if anything happens on your end._

_Wait you’re texting from the ghost realm?_

_Yeah cool right?_

_Very cool. Probably a good idea because my scans show there are a crazy number of ghosts here._

_Define crazy number._

_Close to 50 in just our neighborhood.  
_ _There’s about 150 if you include the whole city._

_Yikes._

_Big yikes._

_The ghosts aren’t causing you problems though, right?_

_No – they seem to only care about finding you.  
_ _The mice are also helping to spread rumors about false places they last saw you._

_Clever!  
_ _Sounds like we’ll return sometime tomorrow afternoon.  
Hopefully by then the ghosts will have given up looking for me or try looking in the ghost realm._

_Sounds good. See you then. Say hi to Keith’s mom for me._

_Will do. Let me know if Lotor shows up._

_I will. Stay safe._

_You too._

Despite the quiet of Krolia’s forest, Lance could barely sleep as he continually checked his phone. Even though he had his notifications turned on, he had a sinking feeling that something would happen and he would need to head to the Holt house at a moment’s notice.

But no messages came.

Lance wanted to leave first thing in the morning, but both Krolia and Keith reasoned that there would be too many ghosts still out at dawn. It wouldn’t be until high noon that the city would be clear of ghosts. When the time came, Krolia was able to make them a portal that took them to the outskirts of town. She and the wolf stayed behind while Lance and Keith made their way to the Holt house. There were a few ghosts to fight on their way there but they were pretty weak and harmless.

When they reached the front door and knocked several times with no response, Lance turned himself intangible and went on inside to find the house deserted. There were signs of a struggle – ectoplasm burn marks, broken dishes, a knocked over lamp. Bae Bae came running up to him, running around and barking frantically.

“What happened, girl?” he asked her as he knelt down and scratched her behind the ears.

“Their car isn’t here, so I’m guessing they drove somewhere,” Keith offered.

Lance fished out his phone and sent Pidge a text asking where they were, but to his horror he heard her phone chirp with the notification. He found it under the coffee table and held it in his hand with a terrified expression, his breath catching in his throat. He looked up at Keith.

“She wouldn’t have left her phone.”

“She probably dropped it because they left in a hurry-“ Keith tried to calm him but Lance could feel his hands begin to shake.

“ _She wouldn’t have left her phone!!_ Something’s happened and we gotta- we have to- we have to find her, Keith!!”

“I’ll call Hunk, see if he knows anything,” he offered, pulling out his own phone. Lance began wandering around the living room and kitchen looking for clues, his composure quickly fading. “Hey, do you know where the Holts are?”

Lance whipped his head and looked expectantly at Keith.

“No, they’re not here. And Pidge left her phone. Yeah, Lance is freaking out.”

“You didn’t have to include that bit!” he hissed.

“Yeah. Kay, bye.” Keith put his phone in his pocket and looked at Lance. “Hunk knows nothing. So wherever they went, they went in a hurry. Know anyone else they might contact if they left somewhere?”

“Veronica.” He tucked Pidge’s phone away and pulled out his own to call his sister. She knew nothing as he explained the situation to her and ended the phone call by telling him she was on her way over. Lance went into the lab he was most familiar with, calling out Keith’s name as soon as he saw the damage.

The portal was completely destroyed, shards of glass and metal scattered about giant green smears of ectoplasm and black scorch marks. When Keith reached his side, Lance said softly in a trembling voice.

“He took her… and destroyed the only way we could follow him.”

Keith placed a reassuring hand on his shoulder. “Not the only way.”

“You can’t pinpoint the location of your portals! And even if you _could_ , we have _no idea_ where they could be. This is—” He fell to his knees, his hands clenching into fists against his thighs. “ _This is all my fault_.”

“It’s not your fault, Lance.” Keith knelt down next to him, his expression empathetic as he placed a hand on his shoulder. “You can’t go down the road of how things would have been different if you had done something. All you can do is work with what you’ve got. There’s a good chance the Holts are still alive, so let’s work on finding them first.”

Lance blinked back the tears as he nodded. “Okay…”

“I know a rift we can pass through to get to the ghost realm, but we still need to figure out where to find Lotor, otherwise we’ll be wandering aimlessly.” Keith creased his brows and frowned. “Unless you think Lotor could be somewhere on Earth? Wasn’t he working on building a portal when you saw him at the gala?”

“You’re right… but… Pidge says he has multiple mansions so… even if we _knew_ all his different houses how could we possibly check all of them?”

 _You don’t have to,_ Chulatt panted as she and the other three mice came running in. _We followed them, we know where Lotor is keeping Pidge!_

“You do?” Lance asked. “What about the rest of the Holts?”

 _They ran to the hospital,_ Plachu said. _The dad got hurt pretty badly._

Lance cursed, wondering how badly Pidge was hurt if her father ended up in the hospital. “How did you guys get back here if you followed him into the ghost realm?”

 _There’s a rift - near the park,_ Platt explained between huffs. _It’s kinda small though - so you’ll have to - squeeze through._

“Chulatt and Platt, you stay here,” Lance instructed, seeing that the smallest mouse and the fattest mouse were completely out of breath. “Tell my sister what’s going on when she gets here and Plachu and Chuchule will lead us to Pidge.”

The mice all nodded in agreement, the Plachu and Chuchule running ahead as Lance and Keith followed. They passed Veronica on their way out and Lance offered her a hasty “The mice will explain everything!” and then he remembered that Veronica wouldn’t be able to tell what they were saying. _Well, Chulatt is good at charades,_ he mused. If nothing else, Hunk could fill her in.

When they reached the rift, Lance was distraught to see it was barely two feet long and less than a foot in height. Invisible to the human eye, the rift looked like someone tore a hole in the fabric of this dimension, the ghost realm showing through the incredibly small opening while the edges rippled like water.

“Yeah, we can’t fit though _that,_ ” Lance exclaimed.

 _Sure you can,_ Plachu countered. _If you try hard enough._

“I hate to break it to you, but I can’t make my skeleton collapse.”

“Actually you can,” Keith said dully. “You know how you can turn your legs into a ghost tail? Same concept. You can actually distort your body into any shape. How else did you think you got trapped in a thermos?”

“Oh gosh don’t remind me of that.” He swallowed, trying to not think too hard about the concept of body distortion. “So… how do we get through there, exactly?”

“Here, I’ll go first and show you,” Keith offered. As he approached the rift, he placed his hands on the bottom part as if he were about to crawl between the slats of a fence. As he pulled himself through, Lance saw his body contort and flatten like an animated character in a cartoon. Except there was something a bit more realistic about it that made him want to throw up. It was like watching someone’s face get smashed in without all the blood.

“Oh cheese… oh cheese…” He took in a few deep breaths as he psyched himself for it, following after his friend. While it was painless, he could still _tell_ what parts of his body were being smashed as he squeezed himself through the hole. Once he got his shoulders out on the other side, Keith offered his gloved hands to help pull him through. After he was standing on his feet, panting heavily from the adrenaline, he watched the two mice squeeze through with much less difficulty since the hole was almost big enough for them.

“It’s not terribly far,” Chuchule said.

“Hey, you spoke!”

“Yeah, we’re in the ghost realm,” Plachu answered dully. “We can only speak telepathically in your world but this is our world. We can speak out loud if we so desire.”

“Ghost wolf still wouldn’t talk to us,” he pouted.

“He spoke to me,” Keith said.

“What?!”

“After you went to bed, I tried to play some fetch with him outside.”

“Yeah he sucks at fetch.”

Keith laughed. “He really does!” 

“Oh are you talking about Kosmo??” Chuchule piped up.

“Yeah, that’s his name,” Keith answered with wide eyes. “You know him?”

“Oh yeah. He’s an interesting fellow. But anywho…” The pink mouse turned and started scampering away, Plachu following close beside her. “It’s this way!”

Lance looked over at Keith, his heart beating a hundred miles an hour. “You ready for whatever lies ahead?”

“Born ready,” he said with an encouraging smile. It was one of the rare few Lance had ever seen on him and it felt genuine. “Let’s go save Pidge.”

He nodded, taking off at a sprint with a friend he was glad to have at his side.


	9. Giving Up the Ghost

Everything seemed hopeful.

They were on their way to save Pidge, and Lance was more confident going in with Keith at his side despite both of them still healing from their wounds wounds from the day before. Pidge was the smartest girl he knew – if anyone could outsmart their kidnapper or find a way out, it was her.

And then Lance and Keith were intercepted.

By both Zarkon _and_ Sendak.

Despite giving the fight their all, Lance and Keith were grossly overpowered. What made matters worse, the mice tried to fight as well and got severely injured. Lance started to lose hope when Chuchule stopped moving. The outlook was dire as Keith was starting to look a deeper shade of purple from all the bruises blossoming on his skin and Lance could no longer move his right arm as vibrant green blood cascaded from his shoulder.

And then Lotor decided to make an appearance as well.

In his distraction, Lance almost got hit by Zarkon’s chain sword, the very weapon that had wrapped around his shoulder and nearly tore his arm out earlier. In the midst of dodging Zarkon, Lotor whipped out a glowing ectoplasm cord that wrapped around Lance’s torso, constraining his arms and pulling painfully on his injury. He fell over with a cry of pain, completely constricted. Keith was pinned beneath Sendak’s mechanical hand, too injured to free himself.

“I caught the Phantom Paladin for you, now pay up,” Zarkon declared.

“You did not capture him, _I_ did,” Lotor surmised.

“Only because I damaged him enough for you to snatch him. You will pay me what is due,” he threatened with a twirl of his giant sword. “One way, or another.”

“So be it,” he accepted with a challenging grin.

As Lotor and Zarkon fought with their blades, Lance tried to free himself from the binding cord. He could barely move his good arm and when he did it only pulled tighter on his injured shoulder. He tried contorting his body like he did earlier but he was in too much pain. His entire body screamed, fire flaring through his shoulder and causing his head to spin.

When he saw Lotor’s blade retreat out of the cavity of Zarkon’s chest, Lance thought he was hallucinating as the much larger ghost fell over, neon blood spluttering everywhere. Lotor turned to Sendak with an intimidating expression, his voice calm and almost demeaning.

“Do you wish to challenge me for the Phantom Paladin as well?”

Sendak scooped up Keith within his claws, easily holding him bound. “I’ll take this one as my prize,” he growled, leaving the scene with heavy footsteps.

Lance tried to call out to Keith but ended up coughing blood. Before Lotor carried him away, he saw Plachu attempt to get on his feet, legs trembling, only to collapse back onto the ground. Lance closed his eyes and hoped that Pidge would be able to figure something out or that he’d be able to improvise once he arrived wherever Lotor was taking him. Or perhaps Keith would free himself and be able to help, or one of the mice.

Deep down Lance knew all of that was unlikely.

But it was the last hope he had to hold onto.

* * *

Pidge couldn’t believe how fast it all happened.

One second they were fighting Lotor, the next her father laid lifeless on the ground beside her, and then she was yanked away through her parents’ portal and thrust into this room. She had absolutely no equipment on her – not even her smart watch which she wore all the time. Lotor attacked their home early in the morning, before she could wake out of bed. She was still dressed in her lavender sleepwear. 

She should have seen it coming. Of course it made sense for Lance to leave with all the ghosts coming for his bounty as a way to keep his and her family safe from all the hostiles, but it also left her family entirely vulnerable to Lotor paying a visit. She had a feeling there was no way Lance could have stopped him all on his own anyways, but she had to wonder if the damage would have been less with him present.

She wondered where he was and if he was alright.

She knew Lotor wasn’t finished with his plans. Harming Sam was only the first step, otherwise he wouldn’t have bothered kidnapping her. Lotor wanted Lance, for whatever reason, and she was meant to be the bait. She realized too late how much of a fool she had been to nearly confess her feelings to Lance in the ballroom, not accounting for the fact that Lotor probably heard it all in its entirety. Now he was using her feelings for Lance to his advantage, and she feared it would result in getting Lance killed.

Pidge fiddled with the door for hours. There was nothing in the room save for a bed and an end table – there were no air vents, no electrical sockets, not even any light fixtures. Despite the lack of lights, the room was lit up as if it were mid-day (the ghost realm worked by bizarre rules). There was nothing for her to break into or hack, and despite her efforts to fiddle with the door handle with the two bobby pins in her messy hair, she couldn’t unlock it.

After what felt like hours of exhausting all her options – even to the point of yelling and begging for Lotor to let her out – she curled up on the bed and sobbed. For all she knew her father could be dead and Lance would soon join him. Amidst her sorrow, her mind played over all the happy moments she had with her father as if she had to pick a story to tell for his eulogy. She hated it and how it only made deepened her grief. Her mind consequentially also ran through all the happy moments with Lance, all the times she could have and should have simply told him how she felt.

_“If I ever get out of this thing, I’ll make it all up to you.”_

But what had she ever done for him?

Lance had quite literally thrown himself in the way of danger to protect her (and could have easily died from that glass shard in his back), saved her from ghost attacks on several occasions, and always had her on the front of his mind despite the numerous more pressing things he could worry about. Even after his date with Allura he was thinking of how he could make amends with her.

“Come on, Pidge, think!” She wiped the tears from her face and sat up, a determination burning in her bones. Her mind ran a hundred miles an hour from the adrenaline as she tried to come up with some feasible solutions. As she thought about everything she knew about the ghost realm, it was something Lance once said that ultimately triggered the answer to her dilemma.

_“The ghost realm and our realm are like two sides of the same coin, right? It explains why everything is opposite, even down to the color of the sky.”_

“Everything is opposite...” It explained why Lance’s clothes went inverted when he first turned ghost, why gravity didn’t affect ghosts, why they were cold to the touch, why their blood was bright green instead of dark red. She stared at the door knob with a sudden realization. “ _Everything_ is opposite.”

When she tried her bobby pins again, this time fiddling with the lock to _lock_ the door instead of unlocking it, the door gave as it slowly opened. She let out a held breath, sticking her pins back into her messy hair and sneaking out of the room and into Lotor’s lab.

It wasn’t hard to find Lance.

All she had to do was follow the sound of him screaming.

What she saw when she entered the giant lab was something straight out of a paranormal horror. Lance was encased in a giant glass cylinder filled with a bright, radioactive yellow-green liquid. Surrounding him in a circle were smaller cylinders and pistons within tall chambers that glowed with ectoplasm, several wires and tubes connecting everything together. The metal flooring beneath the mechanism hummed in intervals, matching up with the timing of the chambers powering up and down. What was most disturbing was the sight of Lance – he was intangible but several tubes passed through him like a hospital patient hooked up on life support.

But Lance kept shifting from being intangible to solid to invisible to being _human_ and back again.

In his glitching state, sometimes the tubes would be embedded within his solid human flesh. She now understood why there were tendrils of green and red swirling about in the liquid cylinder. As she watched the chambers fill with ectoplasm every time Lance turned human, Pidge connected the dots.

Lotor was trying to strip away the ghost in his DNA.

She saw the madman standing with his back to Lance, pouring over the control center where his hands made adjustments and his eyes hungrily read the ever-fluctuating numbers. Pidge thought about simply killing the machine’s power, but feared that would somehow harm Lance while he was in the middle of shifting between different forms. The only way she could stop this was to reason with Lotor or get him away from the control panel long enough for her to safely shut it down.

She took a deep breath, stood up from her hiding spot and strode over towards the scientist. “Lotor, you have to stop this, now!”

He looked over at her, not too surprised by her making an appearance. He returned his attention to the control panel, continuing to monitor the levels as he spoke to her. “I am actually doing your friend a favor.”

“You’re _killing_ him!! Don’t you see that!? I’ve done _thorough_ research on the matter, both his and your DNA has mutated – you can’t _fix_ it! Removing the ghost mutation will only damage the DNA and ultimately result in death!”

“You think a renowned scientist _hasn’t_ done his research?” Lotor laughed and it sent a chill down her spine. “I know more about human and ghost anatomy than you could possibly imagine. I truly hope Lance will be the last test subject and that your precious friend will be completely human again. The boy could actually rest at night instead of fighting ghosts, could pursue his life goals of becoming a pilot, wouldn’t have to worry about telling his family what he is, and you two could live a normal, happy life together.”

Her eyes widened. “How do you know all that?” She swallowed heavily, her chest growing tight. Her stomach twisted at how Lotor knew she wanted to be together with Lance. “And what do you mean, _the last test subject?”_

“As every good scientist does – _research._ It was tricky to duplicate the anomaly Lance and I share, but thanks to the research your parents put into their portal, I was able to create as many test subjects as I needed.”

Pidge could feel herself trembling with fear and anger at the disturbing realization. There was no knowing how many innocent lives this man had destroyed, all for the sake of science and curing a plight he should have known was permanent. “You’re _mad_.”

“Quite contrary… I only desire to be _human.”_

Realizing she could no longer reason with him, she made the plunge. “You can never be human after all you’ve done!” She reached out for the controls but he easily shoved her away. She hit the floor hard but got right back up only to run into a semi-translucent green shield. Lotor set up a ghostly barrier around himself so her only option now was to attack the machine.

As she tried unclasping pistons and pulling plugs, they moved on their own to reconnect. Lotor was fixing things telekinetically and she was fighting a losing battle. She looked up at Lance in terrified desperation, the increasingly rapid sounds of the machine indicating that their time was running out. She found a long lead pipe along the back wall and began smashing the glass container where Lance stood, but before she could get more than a few cracks, the pipe was thrust out of her hands and flung across the room.

Pidge screamed, slamming her fist in angry desperation against the glass, pushing through the blood that spilled and splattered from her punches. Eventually the glass broke a hole large enough for her to reach her arm through the spilling liquid and grab hold of several wires. She attempted to pull them out of Lance when he was intangible, only to find they had some kind of powerful magnetic draw to his body. She yanked as hard as she could until they broke free, eliciting a scream from both her and Lance.

The wires shocked her, the direct contact to ectoplasm causing a strip of her hair to turn white. The force traveled painfully up her arm and thrust her away, causing her to tumble down the steps. She coughed heavily when she tried to pull herself back onto her feet. It hurt too much to move. The most she could do was turn and watch with horrified eyes, screaming his name as she watched him fade. Her heart dropped as she saw green blood spilling Lance's mouth, his form going human for the last time.

His blue eyes slowly closed with a strained exhale.

And the lab was filled with the control panel’s flat tone of death. 


	10. The Spirit is Willing

She had never felt such despair in her life.

A sinking feeling overcame her entire being, pulling her further and further into the void. She gave in to the darkness, allowing it to lull her into a sense of nothingness. She barely noticed in her blurred vision the blinding flash of the teleporting wolf, the fight between three purple-skinned ghosts, or how careful hands helped her up onto her feet and she was suddenly pulled into an entirely different setting.

All she could hear was the continuous flatline ringing in her ears.

"Katie... _Katie!!"_

"Wh-" She blinked slowly as if she were waking from unconsciousness, but her heart still threatened to burst from her chest despite her sluggishness. She was sitting upright on her couch, her mother gently shaking her shoulders. As her vision cleared, she met her mother's concerned gaze and was pulled into a tight embrace. Over her mom's shoulder she saw Keith in his ghost form as well as another woman who looked a lot like him and what she could only assume was the giant teleporting wolf Lance encountered (she admits now that it _was_ huge and Lance wasn't exaggerating as she originally thought). Keith looked like he was on the verge of death, his normally bright eyes barely glowing and his purple skin covered in dark patches and green smears.

"W-where's Lance?" she rasped.

"I don't think you want to see him," Veronica said heavily from the other side of the room. She was sitting on the floor, holding Chulatt in her arms, her face stained with tears and her hollow, bloodshot stare moving from the ground to look at Pidge. "It's... horribly grotesque." She let out a pained sigh, covering her face with one of her hands. "I have no idea how we're going to explain his body to my family."

Pidge pulled away from Colleen and looked to Matt who sat by her side. He had his arm in a sling but otherwise looked fine, aside from the bloodshot eyes everyone in the room shared. "What about dad?" she asked.

"Dad's... _alive_ , at least," Matt answered. "He's in a coma though, and it doesn't look good..."

Her heart fluttered at the news. At least she hadn't lost two people she loved in one day, although it sounded like her father was close to it. She held on to the statistic that most comas weren't permanent, the longest span averaging around a few years. While it was dire, her father had a better chance than Lance. "There's gotta... there's gotta be something we can do..." She stood up and took a few steps before turning to Keith. "Where is he?"

“He’s in the lab,” he answered. His brows creased in worry. “Are you sure you’re ready to see that?”

“I owe him at least that much,” she said softly.

Everyone wasn’t exaggerating when they said the damage was upsetting. Lance laid on the floor, human, covered in patches and smears of bright green blood. On parts of his body his veins showed up in the same eerie green, branching across his dark skin like a disease. The worst part was the sections of wires _still embedded_ within his flesh. It appeared that two of them were violently torn out of his left arm, probably an accident from Krolia and Keith’s attempt to free him. His arm was a raw gruesome mess of both human and ghostly anatomy.

Pidge tried to keep the bile down that threatened to leave her throat. She felt her skin grow cold and the ground begin to spin the longer she looked at him. Her chest and shoulders began to shake as she tried to hold back her tears and look away.

Her eyes moved away and looked directly at the drawers that held containers of ectoplasm. The wheels in her head slowly turned as her mind grasped at hopeful improbabilities. 

“Mom?”

“Yes, Katie?” She quickly stood next to her and wrapped an arm around her daughter’s shoulders.

“Remember how we used the ectoplasm as a steroid of sorts when we performed surgery on Lance?” As she further constructed the idea, her mind slowly cleared from the shock. “What if we try using them again as a sort of ghostly defibrillator?”

She thought for a minute before answering. She didn't want to give her daughter a false sense of hope, especially when she wasn't certain it would work. “We can certainly try.”

“Has anyone told Hunk?” She turned to face everyone else in the room.

“No… we haven’t exactly been here long,” Keith explained.

Pidge cursed. “We’re going to need his engineering brain since my father isn’t here. I’ll tell him myself,” she announced, deciding it’d be easiest coming from her. “And you – Keith’s mom I’m assuming—” She pointed to Krolia and she gave a nod. “Can you extract the remaining tubes in Lance’s body by turning them intangible? And Keith, help her to treat and wrap his wounds.” She knew both ghosts were best suited for treating Lance's injuries, both in ability to remove the tubes and stomach the gore. She had seen Keith slash ghosts open without so much as a flinch. 

“What do you want me to do?” Matt asked.

“Uhh… moral support.” She offered him a thumbs up. “Help mom out with stuff. I’ll be back with Hunk, eventually. Hopefully it won’t take too long…”

When she got outside, leaning up against the front door closed behind her, she took in several deep breaths and tried to will herself through the image of Lance’s damaged body. She forced her knees to stop shaking as she took a brave step forward. She had to be strong for Hunk so he could come over and help them find a solution to bring Lance back.

There had to be a way to bring him back.

* * *

Hunk surprisingly came around a lot faster than Pidge was expecting. He was still a sobbing wreck, but he got his determination in order and worked up a storm, running around the lab with Colleen as they brainstormed and put things together. Krolia and Keith fixed up Lance the best they could so he was covered in bandages instead of holes (which was good for Hunk’s sake, who still threw up at the sight of bandaged up Lance). Pidge kept herself busy helping prepare the machinery that would hopefully resurrect him.

When the doorbell rang she froze. She told everyone to stay in the lab and that she would go answer it. When she swung the door open it was the last person she was expecting – or even wanting – to see.

“Allura??”

“Pidge, I heard about your father and I wanted to give you and your family my condolences,” she said softly, holding out a bouquet of brightly colored flowers to her. “I’m so sorry.”

“Wh- How do you even know about my father?” She took the flowers from her and felt her stomach knot. She knew Allura meant well but the flowers were too happy considering the circumstances.

“My godfather Coran and your father are close friends. Naturally, he found out.”

“Oh. Right.” She recalled that her father and Coran would visit and play 3D chess on a regular basis. Sam even invited her to join them sometimes to hang out with Coran’s goddaughter, but Pidge felt too awkward, too _different_ from Allura to ever hang out with her or be her friend. She felt bad now for jumping so quickly to conclusions, but she couldn't focus on that now. “Speaking of… there’s umm… there’s more you should know about. This is… hard to say, so you should come inside.”

“Oh, okay.” She frowned sympathetically and stepped into the living room, letting out a sharp gasp when she saw Kosmo sitting in the kitchen. She was about to pull out her ghost ray gun when Pidge stopped her, holding her arm down.

“I know you have every reason to hate him, but there’s something more pressing you need to know about.”

Kosmo let out a deep whine, bowing his head in shame. Keith, who was sitting on a barstool at the kitchen counter, translated. "He says he's really sorry about your father's lab."

“Godfather,” Allura corrected, her face a mixture of anger and bewilderment as she realized her classmate was also half-ghost and could talk to giant ghost wolves.

"He says he was starving. He eats electricity," he said plainly and then took a swig from his glass of water. "He also says Lance tried his best and that you shouldn't hold it against him."

"I... I will try." 

Pidge handed the flowers to Keith (who held them awkwardly before holding them out for the wolf to sniff) and beckoned Allura to follow her down the hallway. “But… speaking of Lance… since you’re one of the few that know about what he really is… you should see this.”

A part of Pidge hoped Allura would have some insight on the situation since she knew a thing or two about hunting ghosts. Lance wasn’t quite clear about how she came to acquiring anti-ghost technology aside from a "sympathizer" helping her out. She had a sinking feeling it was Lotor, especially now knowing exactly how much he knew about every detail of Lance’s life.

“Actually,” Pidge spun around in the hallway just before they entered the lab. “It might be easier to… to tell you, before you see it.”

Allura’s face grew grim. “What happened?”

“Lance is…” She swallowed, not realizing how hard it would be to vocalize. Her throat suddenly tightened, the nausea threatening to return. “Lance is… t-technically dead.”

“…what?” Her voice was barely above a whisper, her expression crestfallen. A while ago she might have dreamed about vengefully defeating Lance but she never imagined killing him. She pushed past Pidge to see the truth for herself, covering her mouth with her hand, her eyes widened in shock.

Pidge allowed her a moment to soak it all in and compose herself. She couldn’t bombard her with questions right after seeing her friend’s dead body, but they also needed to make progress if they were going to save Lance. Allura sat in a chair for a few minutes, staring at Lance’s body with an emptiness in her eyes.

“Allura, do you by chance have any affiliation with a man by the last name of Lotor?” Pidge asked.

“Yes…” Her gaze suddenly became determined as her eyebrows lowered, her tone becoming enraged. “Was he the one behind all of this?”

“He is half-ghost just like Lance but he was trying to cure himself of something that he should have known was permanent. He tried to extract the ghost part out of Lance and it… it killed him.”

Allura groaned loudly in frustration. “No! How could I have been so blind?!” She stood up and angrily paced about the room. “I _helped_ him develop technology that would drain a ghost of their ectoplasm! I thought it would just be for the utilization of these weapons he gave me, not to make some machine that would kill someone! I contributed to all this! I made it possible for Lotor to destroy Lance!”

“Allura, calm down,” Pidge said softly, grabbing a hold of one of her shaking arms. “You had no idea Lotor had bad intentions. We’re trying to figure out a way to save Lance so any insight you could give us would help.”

She took a deep breath. “No, you’re right. Let me take a look at what you’ve put together so far.”

* * *

Hours passed.

Several attempts were made to revive Lance.

After many revisions and alterations, he still remained lifeless.

Pidge lost count how many attempts they had made. She crumpled on the floor next to him, gently holding his crimson-stained hand. Her right hand was wrapped in bloody bandages to cover her cuts from when she punched the glass and it hurt to wrap her hand around his. She didn't exactly need to squeeze his hand since he couldn't feel it, but she still clenched through the pain to hold onto him tightly. Most everyone had gone into the kitchen to eat some dinner so it was just her and Keith in the lab.

“Pidge, you should get some food. Have you eaten at all today?” he prodded.

“I’ll be there in a minute. Just…” She could feel the tears starting to come, her voice becoming thick with emotion. “Just give me a minute with him, okay?”

Keith nodded, offering her shoulder a reassuring squeeze before leaving her alone.

When she saw him die, she could barely process what had happened. Her body had gone into shock and too many things happened all at once. Then she jumped right into the task of saving him, furiously working through equations and coming up with some kind of solution. She welcomed the distraction of solving a problem but after all the failed attempts the reality that Lance was dead and was going to stay that way was starting to hit her hard.

“I was such an idiot,” she said between sobs. “Thinking I could bring you back from the dead when Lotor literally stripped away half of your DNA.” She let out a laugh, pathetic and lifeless. “I even told Lotor that he couldn’t cure himself by taking away what made him half-ghost, so _why the hell_ do I think that shoving ectoplasm into your veins will save you?!”

She stared at his lifeless face and felt the weight of her emotion tearing her from the inside. She yearned to see his deep blue eyes, to hear his voice, watch his mouth curve into one of his rare, genuine smiles. Now she never could.

Lance was _gone_.

And there was no bringing him back.

Despite all the impossible things ghosts could do that Pidge had yet to explain with proper science, they still obeyed the laws of life and death, and Lance was still _human_. She felt foolish for thinking – for actually _believing –_ they could resurrect him with some stores of ectoplasm. She felt the failure collapsing upon her, breaking something deep within.

“Why couldn’t I ever tell you that I loved you?! Why was that _so hard_ for me to do? And now you’re- you’re…!”

She couldn't stop the tears from flowing even if she tried. Her choking sobs turned into angry wails. She didn’t just lose her friend – she lost her _best_ friend, she lost the one she loved with all her heart. She crumpled on top of him, grabbing fistfuls of his shirt as she sobbed into his neck.

Minutes passed.

The sobs that wracked her body wouldn't stop.

When she felt Lance’s chest rise and heard him inhale, she thought she was hallucinating. It was weak but clearly there. She whipped her head up to see his lips parted, his eyelids slowly lifting to reveal that his irises were a much lighter green, almost silver in color.

“Lance!?” She held his face, gently brushing his bangs back. “Lance, you…!” Her mouth floundered as she tried to comprehend the fact he was somehow alive. “You’re okay!”

The corner of his mouth barely twitched as if he were trying to give her a smile, but his eyes quickly closed, his body too weak to respond. To confirm she hadn’t hallucinated it, Pidge found he had an incredibly faint pulse.

Lance was alive.

She couldn’t explain why or how, but he was alive.

And to her, that’s all that mattered. 


	11. The Flesh is Weak

After an hour of relief and confusion, it was Keith who made the connection of how Lance was brought to life. He prodded Pidge with a few questions about what happened in Lotor’s lab and came to the conclusion that when she tried to pull the wires free from Lance and was blasted away, she took a portion of his ectoplasm with her, which explained the strip of white hair. Her tears must have leaked enough of his ectoplasm to “jumpstart” Lance (Hunk excitedly dubbed them as “radioactive tears”). It sounded like something straight out of a fairy tale, but Pidge was more than happy to take it.

Lance was barely breathing in his current condition. Colleen put together a makeshift ventilator to help stabilize him. She calculated that he’d only have days to live off of the ectoplasm they gave him, and then he’d be back to where he was an hour ago.

“We need to steal back the canisters of his ectoplasm at Lotor’s lab,” Keith concluded. “If we put his ectoplasm back in him, he might survive.”

“You say might,” Hunk cautioned, “as if this isn’t an absolute.”

“There are no absolutes,” Keith said simply. “In theory it should work, but there’s no knowing whether it’ll work or not.”

“Great. We’re going against impossible odds and we’re not even sure it’ll work.”

“Hunk, this is Lance’s _life_ we’re talking about,” Pidge hissed.

“I know I know! I’m not saying we shouldn’t do it, I just wish we had better odds than ‘he might survive,’” he said with air quotes.

“Well at this rate, it’s better odds than we had an hour ago,” Matt added.

“Kosmo and I can stealth into the lab and steal the canisters,” Keith offered.

“You can’t sneak past a ghost,” Allura scoffed, her arms crossed. “Lotor would be able to see you coming. You’ll need a distraction, which is why I’m coming along too.”

“If you’re the distraction, Lotor will know something’s up since you don’t know how to get into the ghost realm.”

“I’ll accompany you,” Krolia said. “I have some allies who could help in a distraction while you and Allura sneak in by using Kosmo.”

“That…” Pidge started, “Actually sounds like a solid plan.”

“How many containers would you say there are?” Keith asked. “Of Lance’s ectoplasm, that is.”

Pidge frowned. She wasn’t exactly counting how many were filled while she was trying to break Lance free. “Anywhere between six and a dozen? I also walked in part-way through the extraction, so I have no idea how many could have been filled before I arrived.”

Keith made a low hum. “Because I’m guessing we’re going to need all of them if we want to keep Lance alive.”

“I’m going to go reach out to my contacts,” Krolia announced. “Kosmo, meet up at my place in thirty minutes, we’ll head out from there.” She made a circle motion with one of her hands and a swirling black hole appeared in front of her like a door. She walked through and disappeared, the portal vanishing soon after.

“Woah… your mom is so cool,” Hunk said in awe.

Keith turned to Allura. “You have everything you need or do you have to run to your house?”

“No, I’m ready,” she said with a nod.

“If you three could also… destroy as much of his lab as you can,” Pidge said. “That way he can’t hurt anyone else.”

“Oh trust me…” Allura said with a fire in her eyes. “I’ll destroy anything of Lotor’s that I can get my hands on.”

* * *

All they could do was wait.

Pidge remained glued to Lance’s side. They laid him out on the bed in the guest room and along with the ventilator Colleen hooked him up to an IV to help him rehydrate. He was still too weak to do anything beyond resting. Pidge sat on the bed with her legs folded beneath her, her hand never leaving his.

Hunk came in with two coffees, handing one to Pidge. “Nothing like a 6 PM coffee run. But it looked like you could really use it. You’ve looked better after pulling three all-nighters in a row.”

She scoffed. “Is it that bad? What is this, by the way?” she asked, taking a sniff at the lid’s opening.

“Mocha with extra chocolate. Geez Pidge, it’s not like I know everything about you.” He took a sip of his and took a seat in a chair at the bedside. “So when are you gonna…” He side-eyed Lance and returned his gaze to her.

She let out a nervous laugh. “Wh-what do you mean?” She took a long swig of her mocha to hide her spreading blush.

“Pidge. _I know everything about you_ ,” he said with a deadpan. “You wouldn’t have thrown yourself in harm’s way for—”

She quickly situated her coffee cup between her knees and threw a finger to her lips to get him to stop. She patted all her pockets and looked around, realizing she had no idea where her phone was. “Gimme your phone,” she said, reaching out to Hunk.

He raised an eyebrow at her but handed it on over. She typed out a message and handed it back to him to read:

_I’ll tell him eventually. Now’s not a good time._

Hunk looked up at her with a mischievous grin, typing his reply and handing it back to her.

_I’ll be holding you to it once he’s on his feet again._

Pidge wasn’t sure if Hunk was being encouraging or threatening. It was hard to tell with him sometimes.

_I’ve been trying to say it. I really have._

_It’s obvious he likes you too. Lance is too dense to realize it._

_You think so?_

_I know so. Breaking bro code here, but he totally talks about you in a different way than he does other girls. And you’re always the first one on his mind._

_Wow. You broke the bro code for me._

_Correction: I broke the bro code for both of you. Because you’re both idiots who needed to get together like… a year ago. It’s been painful to watch._

Pidge laughed, handing his phone back without typing a response. “Thank you, Hunk. We’re both lucky to have a friend like you.”

He shrugged his shoulders as he took a sip of his coffee. “I do my best.”

* * *

When everyone returned, Keith and Allura managed to grab ten canisters from Lotor’s lab without being noticed. Lance was so depleted of ectoplasm that all they had to do was open the container and the eerie green liquid flowed right into his chest, leaving no trace that anything wet had stained his shirt.

After the third one, Lance sat upright with wide eyes. They were still a pale green silvery color which had Pidge worried. “Wait,” he panted, slowly taking off his oxygen mask. “They’re different.”

“What?” Pidge narrowed her eyes as she held the fourth container, ready to open the clasp. “What do you mean?”

“I-I…” He groaned, rubbing his forehead with his left hand, wincing at the pain in his still healing forearm. “I don’t know, the third one was _different_ though. Like… drinking lukewarm tap water compared to drinking cool filtered water.”

Pidge turned to Keith. “Where did you find all these canisters?”

“We grabbed them from some kind of storage closet,” Keith explained. “There were _hundreds_ of them… so we grabbed the ones closest to the door as well as a few that were still around the machine.”

“And none of them were labeled or color-coded? What is he, an _animal??”_ She was appalled but also disturbed by the fact there were so many… she knew they couldn’t possibly all belong to Lance. She picked up another container and held out both of them to him. “Tell me, do these feel different to you?”

He took turns touching each with his left hand, biting his lower lip as he kept moving his hand back and forth between the two. “I… can’t tell any difference.”

She set one down and picked up a different one. “How about these two?”

Lance closed his eyes and scrunched his face like he was thinking too hard as he felt both the canisters. He cracked open one eye. “They feel the same. I don’t think I notice it until I absorb it.”

“Wait a second…” Pidge pulled both of them closer to her, weighing them in her hands. The newest one she picked up felt like it was pulsing, as if there were a heartbeat within the ectoplasm. She looked up at Lance. “I’m going to open each of these and I have a feeling this one—” She held up the one in her left hand. “—is going to feel different like that other one.”

Lance nodded and she opened the one in her right hand. He absorbed the vibrant liquid, letting out a deep exhale when it was emptied. “That one felt normal,” he confirmed.

She looked down at the second canister for a second before opening it up for him to consume. He absorbed it just the same, but he somehow looked more refreshed. His skin was slowly gaining more color and his eyes were starting to look more like their usual ghostly-green.

“That one was definitely different!!” he exclaimed.

“How can you tell that one was different?” Allura asked, looking between Pidge and the five remaining canisters on the floor.

“I… I don’t know how… but it’s like some of them have a pulse while others don’t,” she explained.

“Those ones are probably ectoplasm that belongs to Lance,” Keith said.

Hunk let out a gasp. “You can probably tell which ones are his because you absorbed some of his ectoplasm when you touched the machine!” His voice softened to barely above a whisper. “That’s so _poetic.”_

Pidge rolled her eyes but focused her attention on Lance when he spoke. “Is that how you got…?” He stroked a finger along his hair by his temple, mirroring Pidge’s new white streak.

“Oh, this?” She twirled a finger around the white lock and then let it fall back to frame the side of her face. “Yeah, most likely. Or you know… stress.”

He looked at her with a bittersweet expression, his eyes apologetic but mixed with something softer, as if he felt bad it had happened but also admiring how it looked on her. Pidge felt her heart skip a beat, averting her gaze and quickly moving to grab another container.

Once they exhausted all the gathered containers of ectoplasm, it turned out only three of them belonged to Lance.

“Do _you_ by chance know how many containers Lotor filled with your ectoplasm?” Keith asked.

Lance threw his head back and let out a dark laugh. “Yeah, because between my vision blacking out and literally getting the life sucked out of me, I felt like _counting things._ ”

Keith raised his hands defensively. “Just covering all of our—”

“Thirteen,” Lance answered dryly. “Pidge helped me learn it’s a good distraction.” He shrugged, letting out a whine at the pain it caused. “So there’s ten more canisters at Lotor’s lab with my name on them. Not literally, since he doesn’t label things. But… you know what I mean.”

“And we need Pidge to go since she can detect which ones belong to Lance,” Allura said. “Krolia’s distraction worked great last time, so perhaps we could do it again with Pidge joining me, Kosmo, and Keith.”

“I’m going too,” Lance said.

Everyone simultaneously erupted with variations of “no.”

“Whyyyyyy?”

“Lance, I hate to break it to you buddy,” Hunk said, leaning in his chair to place a hand on top of his. “But you can’t exactly move your right arm and your left arm is all torn up. And you kinda just woke up from literal _death_ , so going in and fighting is not the wisest thing you could do right now.”

“Besides…” Pidge added. “Things could get bad real fast if Lotor saw you were alive.”

He slowly slumped down into a more reclined position, his lips twisting into a pout. “But what if things get bad real fast because _I’m_ not there?”

She deadpanned. “Can you even make yourself intangible right now?”

“Sure I can!” he said defiantly but he managed to turn only his right arm invisible. “Oh cheese.”

Pidge sighed. “You’re staying here, it’s decided.”

* * *

The team decided to rest for a few hours before heading back to the ghost realm (mostly for Pidge and Keith’s sake, who were far too tired or injured to perform well), while Hunk caught Lance up to speed on everything. He was relieved to see Chuchule and Plachu were fine, resting on his bed and healing from their injuries.

“How did you guys get me out of Lotor’s lab?”

“Apparently,” Hunk began, “Pidge tried getting you out, but… obviously was too late since you died. Keith, Krolia, and Kosmo came to rescue both of you. The K Team, as I like to call them.” He chuckled.

“How… how did Keith get free from Sendak?”

“I think Krolia helped him. Or Kosmo. Or both.” Hunk shrugged. “I don’t really know the details on that.”

“Huh.” Lance sucked on his lime popsicle for a moment. “And Pidge crying brought me back to life??” he asked skeptically with an arched brow.

Hunk’s eyes lit up as he scooted a little closer in his chair. “Yeah, so we’re guessing that when she pulled some of the wires out of you she somehow took a part of your ectoplasm with her, and then when you were dead, she cried on you and her tears were like, radioactive with your ectoplasm and stuff so it kinda jumpstarted you back to life.”

His eyebrows shot up. “Wild.” He gnawed on his popsicle for a moment. “Is Pidge alright though? She seemed kinda… spent.”

“It’s been a rough day for her.”

“Totally understandable.”

“But I think she’ll be fine. She was looking phenomenally better as soon as you came back.”

“Oh good,” he said with a reassuring sigh. “Sorry to have been dead for so long.”

“What was it like being dead? Did you see a light at the end of the tunnel?”

“What? No! I uhh…” His lips twisted into a frown. “I just remember the last thing I saw was Pidge breaking the glass and then I woke up to Pidge crying in front of my face. Didn’t quite make the connection that six hours had passed between those two points. Or that I was dead.”

“ _The last and first thing you saw was Pidge thatissopoetic,”_ Hunk whispered in fevered excitement.

“What?”

“Nothing. How are you feeling though? I know you were dead not long ago, but… you gotta be feeling somewhat better, right?”

“I’m actually trying my hardest to not focus on that right now,” Lance said weakly, the exhaustion showing in his face. Earlier, Colleen informed him about his injuries and he was legitimately scared to see what his flesh looked like beneath all the bandages. He remembered the tubes that continuously tore holes into his body as he shifted between being ghost and human and he wondered what kind of horrific scars would forever mar his skin. “If I think about it, it feels worse than death. Which, I can credibly say now.” He gave a weak chuckle, popping the popsicle back into his mouth.

“Well… hopefully when they return all your ectoplasm, you’ll be better.”

“ _This_ will be fun to talk to your dad about in a therapy session,” Lance mused.

Hunk held his chin in thought. “How do you bring up the stresses of dying and coming back to life without actually stating that’s what happened?”

“You know I’m thinking of just telling your dad everything.”

“Wha- really??”

“I think he’d understand. Besides,” He laid his head back onto his pillow and stared blankly at the ceiling. “It’d be really nice to have someone to talk to about all this, besides you and Pidge. Veronica worries too much or tries to help me fix my problems and only makes them worse, Keith is no expert on making others feel better, and the Holts – as much as I love them – would only think of additional experiments the more I talked to them about this stuff.” He closed his eyes and let out a long exhale. “And even if your dad doesn’t believe me? He can treat me for hallucinating or something but I’d still be able to talk about it.”

He offered him a soft smile. “Yeah, I think that would be good for you.” Hunk knew that he and Pidge coped by keeping their hands busy when they were stressed, but Lance was someone who needed to voice his problems. He also knew that constantly lying to his father was eating away at Lance, who always lived his life honest to a fault. He couldn’t even imagine how strained his relationships much have been with his family. “Do you think you’ll ever tell your parents? I mean… I hate to bring it up, but you’re going to have scars from all this. How are you going to explain that to them?”

Lance let out a heavy sigh, opening his eyes and turning his head to look at his friend. His expression was broken, the worry manifesting in his eyes which ironically had yet to return to their normal blue. “I don’t know, Hunk… Veronica mentioned it too and… I know I need to tell them one day. I know that. But I’m scared. I have no idea what will happen. But Veronica said she’d help me keep it secret for as long as I need, so I’m sure she’ll help me cover my scars. I mean, so long as I wear long pants and long sleeves, the only one I’ll really have to cover is part of my neck. And I’m sure some foundation could hide them… depending on how bad it is…”

If they were successful in restoring the rest of his ectoplasm and Lance could start looking normal again, Hunk knew his family would buy the story of camping with Keith for another day or two. But there was no avoiding the scars. “Maybe you can learn how to turn part of yourself invisible,” he offered. “Make it so only your scars are invisible.”

“I think that would require a lot of concentration.” He frowned. “It’s hard enough to make only one finger invisible.”

“I remember a time when you couldn’t go ghost without saying you were ‘going ghost,’” Hunk said with a laugh. “I’m sure you can figure it out, Lance. Despite all of this being thrust upon you Spiderman-style, you’ve handled it amazingly well. Far better than _I_ could ever do, that’s for sure. And you’re getting better at things every day. I’ve seen you fight ghosts and it’s quite admirable what you’re capable of now, compared to your early days. I know you only see the failures and your shortcomings, especially when you compare yourself to others, but you’ve done a _lot_ , Lance. You’ve done enough. _You are enough_ , exactly the way you are.”

He sniffled, not caring to wipe the tears that cascaded down his cheeks. “I would hug you if I could, Hunk.”

“I would hug you too if it didn’t hurt you,” he said with a sad smile. 


	12. With Grave Respect

Keith and Allura successfully got Pidge into the lab’s dark storage room filled with rows of shelves of glowing green canisters. The number of them made her sick, knowing that Lotor had experimented on humans to try and find a cure. For all she knew, he might have experimented on ghosts as well. She couldn’t let her mind wander to what could have happened. The sooner she got away from this cemetery, the better.

“Found another,” she whispered, grabbing the canister which pulsed beneath her touch.

“How many do we have so far?” Allura asked.

“Six,” Keith answered.

“Why do you think they’re randomly spread across aisles and aisles of these things? Wouldn’t it make more sense to have them all together somewhere?”

“He was probably using telekinesis to store them away,” Keith explained. “It’s not as precise of an art as some people would think. Especially if he was busy keeping Pidge at bay and trying to extract Lance, his mind wouldn’t care where the canisters went, so long as they went in an open spot.”

“That makes sense, I guess…”

“I’ve got another,” Pidge said, handing it to Keith.

A loud boom thundered through the dark storage room, causing all the canisters to tremble ominously. All four of them froze, turning their heads towards the door at the far end of the spacious room. Kosmo turned intangible, hovering slightly as he moved about the shelves. The giant wolf suddenly teleported away, flashing the room with a blinding light before he was gone.

“Where does he think he’s going?” Allura grumbled.

“I think he knows more than we do,” Keith said vaguely. “Pidge, you focus on finding the other three containers, Allura and I will watch your back.”

“Okay.” Pidge wiped her hands nervously against her shorts, her palms already getting excessively clammy. The last thing she needed was to drop and break one of Lance’s canisters. If they had to suddenly leave, would ten out of thirteen be enough? Or would Lance still eventually die? She couldn’t take that risk.

“Perhaps we should keep the fight out there,” Allura cautioned. “If they come in here, they might break the canisters. And that way Pidge will be able to focus without interruption.”

“Smart idea.” Keith turned to Pidge, who nodded in approval. “Let’s see what’s on the other side of that door.” He grabbed Allura’s hand and turned both of them intangible (causing a soft gasp from Allura), and ran outside with her.

“Alright, focus Pidge,” she whispered to herself. “There’s only three more.”

* * *

Lance reckoned he lost ten years of his life when Kosmo materialized right next to his bedside. Both he and Hunk screamed, causing Veronica and Matt and Colleen to all run into the room in a panic.

"It's just Kosmo, guys," Hunk assured them. 

“What are you—” Lance was about to ask, but Kosmo interrupted. Lance wasn’t expecting his voice to be so deep and transfixing.

_You need to come to the lab._

His eyes widened. “I… I _can’t_.”

_You must. Or Pidge will die._

_“What??”_

“What is the wolf saying??” Hunk whined, dying to know.

_This is something only you can do, Lance, being of both human and ghost realms._

“But I can barely move! Let alone fight or even go ghost!!” he sputtered. “Can’t Keith do it? He’s halfsies too!”

 _He is_ born _like that, only you are the anomaly who can properly adapt and withstand what Lotor has planned._

“An autonomous anomaly,” he said worriedly, shaking his head. “But again, I can’t fight in my current state!”

_The realms are two sides of the same coin. What is pain here, will be strength there. What was death there, is life here._

“I died over there but was brought back to life here…”

Kosmo nodded. _It will be easier to harness your ghostly side over there, and once obtained, your wounds will become fuel for the fight._

Lance still looked uncertain. Something deep within him churned at the thought of Pidge dying when he could do something to prevent it, even if it felt like a suicide mission. Keith’s words were brought back to the forefront of his mind: _“You can’t go down the road of how things would have been different if you had done something. All you can do is work with what you’ve got.”_

According to Kosmo, he had a chance to save Pidge.

He wouldn’t let that slip through his fingers.

“Take me to her,” he answered definitively, holding out his left arm to Kosmo. The wolf gently wrapped his jaws around his arm, everyone in the room starting up a protest as they realized what was happening.

And in a blinding flash, they were gone.

When they arrived in the storage room, Lance found himself already in ghost form and in his paladin armor, hovering next to Kosmo. While he could still feel his injuries, they weren’t as incapacitating as they were a moment ago.

“Lance?” Pidge quickly snuck through the aisles to meet them, her eyes wide. “How are you here? You were _bedridden_ and _—”_ Her brows lowered in worry. “Your eyes are silver again.” She turned to face Kosmo. “That’s bad, right?”

_The short answer? Yes. White is a sign of death in the ghost realm. It’s why Lance and Lotor alike have white hair, because they died when they became ghosts. It’s why your hair turned white when you took away some of his ectoplasm as he was dying. Yet again._

“Well let’s change that.” Pidge began cracking open the gathered canisters and Lance took it all in like a breath of fresh air. He didn’t quite notice what had been missing until it was returned to him. It was difficult to recognize the severity of his pain when he couldn't quite recall how he felt before he had died. He felt his body strengthen, a fire igniting within his veins as he quickly became whole again. He let out a deep exhale when she finished releasing the seventh canister, his eyes still silver but his entire countenance appearing more polished. 

He offered her a giant grin, causing her heart to swell, and then swooped in to grab the sides of her face. She barely had time to widen her eyes before Lance planted his lips against hers.

His hands and mouth were cold, as to be expected of his ghost form, but Pidge had never felt such _warmth_ in her life.

She was a surge of contrasting feelings: a heat in her stomach, a chill down her spine. Melting at his touch, her chest tightening. She could barely describe it as everything within her felt everything at once. Her hands found his, moving blindly to wrap around his wrists and keep him anchored there a moment longer.

When he pulled back, their eyes lingering on each other as she moved her hands to delicately hold his. “What…” she breathed, her heart still fluttering, “What was that for?” she asked more in awe than accusingly.

“In case anything happens,” he answered softly, giving her hands an encouraging squeeze before letting her go, flying towards the sounds of battle outside. He gave her one last look over his shoulder before he passed through the wall, Kosmo bounding after him.

Pidge blinked a few times, still processing that _that_ had actually happened. She was exceptionally distracted but tried to get back to work on finding the last three containers of his ectoplasm, a giddy smile refusing to leave her lips for quite some time.

* * *

The chaos Lance hovered into was more than he could imagine.

Lotor had spiraled over the line of sanity, completely mad at the prospect that he could never be fully human again. The pillars surrounding the machine were now bathed in green light, the container that once held Lance prisoner was gone, and the floor beneath formed a swirling mass of darkness. It was different from a portal in the fact that it was sucking objects into its void.

Lotor had turned his machine into a singularity.

If Lance had learned anything about how his world and the ghost realm were intertwined, he knew that one directly affected the other. If a black hole collapsed on this side of the spectrum, there was no telling what kind of damage would happen to the human realm. He knew better than anyone as he was intimately aware of what happened to one half of the coin when the other half was destroyed.

Keith was struggling to fight with all his injuries and Allura was covered in bloody scrapes. Lotor appeared to be in a similar worn out state, so Lance reckoned the playing field was pretty even between all four of them. With his x-ray vision he saw that Krolia and her allies were fighting other ghosts outside the lab, presumably followers of Lotor. The only imminent threat was Lotor and the black hole, which was continually pulling in more of the lab and increasing in the strength of its gravitational pull.

He tried blasting a thick layer of ice over the void, only to watch it loudly crack and shatter down into its center. This caught Lotor’s attention, whose eyes narrowed at the sight of him.

“It appears you refuse to stay dead,” he snarled. “Have you come here to torment me with a mockery of all my work?”

Lance hovered there with a troubled frown. He felt the pain in Lotor’s plight, better than anyone else. “For quite some time I was a lot like you,” he started, his tone almost reverent. “I was scared of what I had become and I wanted nothing more than to just… be _normal_ again. I was lowkey mad that the smartest girl I know couldn’t figure out some kind of cure-all for me either, which wasn’t fair to her, but... I figured out how to live with it, and I know you can too—”

“ _What_ could you _possibly_ _KNOW?!”_ he roared. “Have you told your family what you are only to be rejected by them?” His lips twitched into a smirk when he saw Lance’s expression stiffen in horror. “I didn’t think so. Have you been told you were a monster by the woman you loved? And then shunned by your mutual friends because of her slander? Do you know what it is like to be utterly alone simply because of _what you have become?_ You know _nothing,_ Lance Villanueva.”

He took a shaky breath, uncertain how to address the fellow half-ghost across the room. “It’s awful… what happened to you, how people treated you. But it still doesn’t excuse kidnapping my friend, killing me, and putting an innocent man in the hospital—”

“ _He_ did this to me! This is _all his doing!_ ” He lashed out with an attack, Lance barely dodging green ghostly rays as he counterattacked with some ice.

“It was an _accident!”_ he yelled between attacks. “You should know as a scientist that half of all inventions happen by accident! I know you want someone to blame for all the suffering you’ve been through but there is no one to blame! Sometimes life is like that!”

"Easy for you to say when the inevitable has yet to happen! Your family will eventually find out what you really are and you will understand what it means to be forsaken.” Lotor continued his speech despite Keith occasionally chucking an ectoplasm blade and Allura firing upon him. “We are not merely anomalies to them, we are _abominations_. We do not belong in the same world as them, and in time, they will make that known to you, one way or another."

Lance was distracted by the conviction of Lotor’s words, taking a blast of ectoplasm to his right shoulder, the one Lotor knew was injured. The impact caused him to fall hard on his back with a yelp. All of his injuries flared up and everything felt too weak and heavy to move.

Kosmo interfered with a blast of lightning before Lotor could strike Lance again. The two parried blows until one of Lotor’s hit Kosmo square in the chest, causing the wolf to collapse with a whine as he hit the wall.

A screaming filled the lab as the metal support beams bent from the force of the black hole pulling them from the walls and ceiling. Lance saw it start to curl until it was loosened, flying at an alarming speed towards the void.

Both he and Lotor were struck by the warped metal beam. Lance blindly clawed for whatever his hands could grasp, but the floor was entirely smooth as he was sucked into the black hole’s pull like a rushing river over the edge of a cliff. He heard Lotor’s scream cut off impossibly fast and he had milliseconds to right his body so he could grab onto one of the pillars of the machine at the edge of his demise.

He screamed at the excruciating pain in his arms as he held onto the pillar with all his strength. He could feel his wounds ripping open and it took all of his willpower to not let go from the pain alone.

And then Pidge was shouting his name as she unknowingly came out to the lab with the three found canisters. As the hole pulled her in like a hand yanking her by the ankles, she dropped the canisters with a scream.

“I have a dangerous idea,” Allura fervently announced to Keith as she rapidly assembled something from her thigh holster. They were crouched on the far end of the lab by the control panel, safely out of reach of the void’s gravitational pull for now. She worked fast, shooting at the canisters of Lance’s ectoplasm and managing to break two of them open.

The only thing she had time to shout was Lance’s name before she chucked an explosive towards the black hole.

Luckily Lance was a quick thinker. When the explosion went off it shattered the pillars but also gave Lance a momentary push away from the gravity. He took advantage of the momentum and flew towards Pidge, absorbing his ectoplasm from the containers just as the last unbroken one was sucked into the void. The surge of energy was barely enough for him to grasp Pidge, telekinetically bend the floor enough to give himself a handhold and anchor himself to it.

To say Lance felt like he was being pulled apart was an understatement. His worst injuries were in his arms and right now he was holding Pidge with one and preventing them from dying by holding both their weight with the other. In the adrenaline rush of near-death, Pidge was hanging on to whatever part of Lance's arm she could, grasping the tears in his arm with all her weight. 

“Lance!” Pidge cried with a realization in her eyes. “Break the canisters! Break all of them!” She realized in that moment that Lance needed his specific containers of ectoplasm to live, but he still responded positively to stores of it without his DNA. Lance could absorb _any_ ectoplasm and there was a whole storage room right around the corner that was full of it.

He shut his eyes and Pidge could hear a clattering followed by a chorus of shattering as he tipped a shelf over. Seconds later, a flood of vibrant green came rushing in. As Lance’s body drank it in, Pidge saw his ghostly aura glow increasingly brighter. His grip on her strengthened and he felt the handhold begin to give way to the black hole’s pull. He opened his eyes to look down at her.

“Do you trust me?”

“Always have,” she answered confidently despite the thrumming in her chest.

He took in a deep breath and let go.

As they approached the center of the hole, Lance held Pidge close to him and blasted a layer of ice to cover the singularity like a temporary shield. He knew it would crack open within seconds but a second or two was all he needed. Speeding as fast as he could while the gravity was momentarily weakened, he almost flew out of its range before the ice shattered but was far enough to escape the pull once it resumed wrecking the building. He breathed heavily from the adrenaline, slowly lowering Pidge back onto the ground where Keith, Allura, and Kosmo were gathered.

Lance could barely process everything that had happened but he knew they had to act quickly. “We need to stop the black hole, we can’t just leave.”

“Or it’ll damage the human dimension,” Keith agreed.

“Oh, so you already know that,” Lance said with a sigh. “So… how do we stop it?”

“Those chambers…” Pidge said with a pensive expression as she stared at the singularity. The pillars that surrounded Lance in the machine were mere skeletons now, but somehow still standing despite circling the edge of the void. “They were designed to absorb Lance’s ectoplasm. They might still work to absorb the black hole. The only problem is that the chambers had to pause to recharge before they could extract again. If we want this to work, we’ll have to alternate them so the singularity is continuously being absorbed. If there’s a break absorbing it, it might grow too strong and consume the chambers.”

"I know how to work Lotor's inventions," Allura offered, her face suddenly growing grim. "Sam's condition and Lance dying was all my fault. If I hadn't helped Lotor with his technology, this might not have happened."

"It wasn't your fault, Allura," Keith assured.

"I still need to take accountability for my actions," she said decisively as she stood at the control panel. "I will stay behind and alternate the chambers. It's only right that I keep Lotor from hurting anyone else."

Before Lance or Pidge could protest, Keith gave a solemn nod. "I'll stay behind with you."

“What?? Wait, who said anything about leaving?” Lance objected. “We’re all seeing this through to the end.”

“I have just enough energy to teleport once more,” Kosmo said from his crumpled position against the wall. “Even if the singularity is contained, it is likely the lab will still be destroyed in the process.”

“And I’m staying behind to provide a shield around Allura,” Keith said.

“No…” Lance’s heart dropped as he whipped his head from the wolf to Keith and Allura, understanding the weight of their decision. “I can’t let you do this.”

“Someone has to stop the black hole, Lance!” Allura argued. “Or do you want to take the risk that your neighborhood could be destroyed as a paralleled dimensional consequence?” She was already working on the controls at the panel, her hands moving with a speed of familiarity. The chambers flared to life, half of them ignited in a bright green light. She turned her head to look at Lance, her expression pained, her bright eyes glossy. “It’s okay. I choose this. I don’t want anyone else to suffer because of Lotor… because I helped him. I’ll make certain it doesn’t happen.”

With tears in her eyes, Pidge gently pulled Lance away as Allura continued to alternate the chambers and Keith generated a ghost shield to block flying debris from the crumbling lab. Lance struggled against her, crying in protest with an outstretched arm. It hurt Pidge to fight him but Kosmo made it onto his paws and phased through the both of them.

With a protesting scream, Lance saw Allura and Keith for the last time.

And then everything went white.


	13. Gaze Into the Abyss

_A lot has happened since my last journal entry._  
_For starters, I died. Again.  
__My best friend’s dad was put in a coma.  
__Said best friend was kidnapped.  
__Ooh I also kissed her. Really wasn’t expecting that.  
__I indirectly killed a man. (Is that self-defense?)  
__Two of my friends sacrificed themselves to save us all.  
__It’s been a week and we still haven’t seen them._

 _I have major scarring on my arms. Pidge has shown me how to cover them up with foundation.  
_ _I also have a hand tremor now, thanks to said scars. Or wounds. Whatever. It’s actually quite unnoticeable, it only occasionally gets bad. But it’s… just another thing I have to work through.  
_ _I told Hank everything, with Hunk there to back me up. He surprisingly took it all in. Therapy is way more manageable now, I actually enjoy it.  
_ _Fam still doesn’t know. Just Veronica. I want to tell them. I really do. There’s just… there’s too much right now._

_Crap I never finished that English assignment._

Lance surprisingly had all the energy he needed after everything that happened, but he still felt tremendous pain from his injuries. It was as if the ghost side of him was healing him along but he was still incredibly _human_ , and that thought made the pain a lot more bearable. He spent most nights sitting in a hot bath for a long time, however. He sometimes wondered if he got that final thirteenth container of his ectoplasm if he would have been recovering faster. Maybe he wouldn't have received his hand tremors as a result. It was hard to tell, but at this point he was simply thankful the thirteenth container wasn't necessary for him to continue living. Apparently twelve containers of ectoplasm worked out just fine for him.

The first day back from Lotor's lab was the most difficult. The mice said they found no sign of their friends at the lab when they went back to check. The mice informed them that the lab was completely destroyed and Lance and Pidge assumed that meant their friends were as well. Breaking the news to Coran was difficult. Lance had no idea how to get to Krolia’s house… but he figured she already knew, if she hadn’t died as well.

Lance went with Pidge to see her father.

At this point, Pidge was numb. She suffered so much pain and loss in one weekend that she barely had the energy to cry at the sight of her vegetative father. A few silent tears moved down her cheeks, but that was all she could muster. The only sound in the room was the soft whirring of the machines that kept Sam breathing. 

“I really admire you, Lance,” she said unexpectedly in their silence.

“Huh? What brought that up?” he asked softly.

“Everything that happened this weekend got me thinking… it was all because one man could not forgive another. My father ruined Lotor’s life, there is no doubt about that, but it was an accident. What you said back at his lab… I’ve… I’ve just realized that you have every right to blame all that has happened to you on my parents, or even me. But you never have. You were never even _angry_ at us. You even tried to reason with Lotor in the end…” She was constantly amazed at the strength of Lance's resilience. He could have so easily been overcome with anger at his situation or corruption of his newfound powers but he remained vigilant and honest in everything he did. She let out a shaky exhale, taking in a deep breath to steel her emotion. “I… I feel like if I were in your shoes I would not have been nearly as kind. And I really admire that.”

She finally took her eyes off her father to look up at him when Lance took a hold of her hand. “You’ve been plenty strong too, Pidge…” he said. “You’re always looking out for me, you always go the extra mile when you really don’t have to. And I’ve appreciated it. I’ve appreciated _you.”_

She offered him a smile, squeezing his hand just tight enough to stop his tremor. She returned her eyes to Sam. “Do you think he’ll ever wake up?”

“I don’t know… but…” He pressed his lips together for a moment. “Remember how I said I’d make it all up to you?”

“That was… oh yeah, when you were in the thermos.”

Lance made a growling sound at the memory. His shoulders jerked from a shudder. “Yeah. Well, I’ve been thinking about it… I’ve decided I’m going to figure out how to save your dad.”

Her eyes widened when she looked up at him. “Why would you... ? I don’t even know if it’s possible—”

“If I died and was brought back to life, then we can wake up your dad. I’m sure there’s a thing or two I can learn from the ghost realm if I search for some answers. I don’t think he’s in a normal coma – I think he’s sleeping from some kind of ghost ailment.”

“So you think there’s a way to reverse it…” She pursed her lips together in thought. “I suppose we might as well try, right?”

“Do or do not, Pidge, there is no try,” he said with a knowing grin.

“You’re my only hope, Obi-Wan,” she replied, smiling in kind.

* * *

Life continued as normally as it could, considering all that had happened. Lance and Pidge had their moments of breaking down from the grief of losing Allura and Keith, Sam’s coma, or Lance’s chronic pain and hand tremors. Lance continued fighting ghosts when he could, with the help of both Pidge and Hunk thanks to the Holts' anti-ghost technology. Occasionally Veronica would join, but they all eventually came to the agreement that ghost-hunting wasn’t cut out for her (she managed to get Lance stuck in a thermos again).

One day when Lance was studying with Pidge, he went to answer the door when it rang and he screamed.

Because there stood Allura and Keith.

When Pidge jumped off the couch completely startled and ran to the door with two anti-ghost pistols in her hands, she quickly dropped them when she saw Lance crushing Allura and Keith in a hug. Despite her much calmer reaction, Pidge ran over with happy tears and joined the group hug as well.

The effects of the ghost realm left their mark on them both - Allura’s hair was now white and Keith had a massive scar on the side of his jaw, but they were alive and Lance couldn’t care less about receiving an explanation. Pidge cared, so they learned that it took them almost two weeks to fully heal from the singularity reversing. Krolia was able to create a portal to save them but in her depleted state, she wasn’t able to pinpoint a location. Allura and Keith alike were severely injured, but Krolia was able to slowly nurse them back to health and eventually figured out their location so they could create a portal home. It was merely an issue of healing and technical difficulties.

“Lance, pull yourself together,” Keith said dryly. “You’ve gone through like… four tissue boxes.”

“Only _one,_ Keith!!” Lance sniffled. “I’m just really happy okay?? Don’t take that from me!”

Allura laughed. “I’m sorry we worried you all so terribly…”

“Don’t apologize for dying, jeez,” Pidge playfully scoffed. “Not even Lance has done that.”

Lance froze, whipping his attention to Pidge. “Oh _cheese_ I never did apologi—”

_“Lance it’s a joke.”_

“Oh.” He let out a nervous laugh. “Oh right. Actually, I _did_ apologize to Hunk. But.. I’m… I'm still sorry I died.”

Pidge shook her head at him with a smile, then turned to Allura and Keith. “You know all this crying the past… two weeks? Gosh it’s been too long. But all this crying has me dehydrated and depressed, so how about we go get ice cream to celebrate?”

“Ice cream isn’t exactly the most ideal thing for re-hydration—”

“I swear Lance, if you go on another tangent about _water_ —”

“Ice cream has liquid in it,” Keith reasoned with a shrug and a warm smile. “I think it’s a great idea.”

* * *

They invited Hunk and Matt along to the ice cream excursion and had an enjoyable time catching up with Allura and Keith. For the first time in a long while, Pidge and Lance finally felt _normal_. The fact that Allura and Keith survived gave Pidge a hope that perhaps her father could pull through his comatose state with the help of Lance. She was grateful to have him by her side, which got her thinking this was a good a time as any. She pulled him aside from their table and asked if he wanted to go for a walk and he agreed.

They walked through the nearby park, enjoying some pleasant small talk before finding a secluded bench. Aside from the rippling stream nearby, they were surrounded by a peaceful quiet, a colorful sunset painting the evening sky in vivid pinks and oranges.

“Hey Lance,” Pidge began, her stomach starting to churn the moose tracks ice cream. “I… I have a confession to make.”

He sat up slightly straighter as he felt his heart beat faster. “Yeah?”

“I’ve… I…” She leaned forward and buried her face into her hands, letting out a quick squeal of distress before composing herself again. “Why is this so hard to talk about?”

“What… _are_ you trying to talk about?”

Pidge sat there with her steepled fingers pressed against her lips for a moment in thought. She then moved so fast Lance barely had time to react. Her hands grasped the collar of his jacket and she pulled him in for a kiss. Despite his surprise, he softly moved into it, a hand finding place in her messy curls. She moved her lips against his a few times experimentally, pulling away with a satisfaction in her eyes.

“I like both.”

“Both – wait, what?”

“I like kissing you as both ghost and human,” she clarified. 

Lance’s jaw hung loosely. “Wait, so you actually _like_ me?”

She threw her head back and groaned. “Hunk was right, you are SO dense!!”

“I figured you were always too far out of my league." His mouth floundered for a moment as he stammered. "L-Like… I’m not nearly smart enough for you to be interested in someone like me!”

She wanted to shake him senseless but instead she looked up at him with the angriest pout (which he thought was absolutely adorable) and pressed her lips against his again as her answer. Pidge always preferred actions over words, anyway.

“Okay…” he breathed heavily as they parted. “I take that as a yes. So does this make us lab partners now?”

"What?"

"Nothing."

“Question," she said as she turned her body to the side, tucking her feet up onto the bench, and he likewise adjusted his hips to better face her. "Why did you kiss me that night?” she asked, referring to when they invaded Lotor’s lab. It was a question that was eating at her for several days. She didn't exactly have the right opportunity to ask him about it with everything that happened.

“Because… I…” He felt himself grow red and Pidge could see that his hands were shaking more strongly. She found both of them with hers, interlocking their fingers and giving him an anchor so he could focus. “K-Kosmo kinda said if I didn’t go to the lab you would have died… so I was scared that something would happen and I… I would never have gotten around to letting you know how I feel.”

It was her turn to have wide eyes. “So that was genuine? You didn't kiss me because of an adrenaline rush from the heat of battle or the excitement from being brought back from the dead or something?”

“Of course it was genuine! I- how do I put this. I’ve always liked you, Pidge. Well, for quite a few years at least. I’ve just never pursued you because I figured you weren’t interested. Figured you just wanted to stay friends.”

She let out a big sigh that turned into a groan as she pushed her forehead against his chest, grasping his jacket once more. “Why are we both so stupid when it comes to this sort of thing?” she grumbled.

“Pidge stupid? I don’t think that’s possible.”

“Pidge is the most unparalleled stupid idiot when it comes to feelings.”

Lance smiled, releasing one of her hands to stroke her hair. “Maybe when it comes to addressing them or understanding them… but you feel a _lot_ , Pidge. I’ve never doubted that you care deeply about me. Even when you tease me or poke fun at my expense, you are the kindest person I know. And that’s saying something, because I’m friends with Hunk.” He laughed and was pleased to feel her laughter joining him as it reverberated against his chest.

“I could say the same about you,” she said softly as she tilted her head back to admire him in the warm sunset’s glow. He was gorgeous and she could hardly believe that those ocean eyes were looking at _her_ with complete adoration.

“Then I think we can agree we’re both idiots,” he said softly, moving a hand to brush her bangs aside. His eyes lingered on the white streak mixed in with her honey locks, his fingers curling around it. She threw her life in the way of danger to save him and that kind of love was forever etched upon her appearance. The scars on his arms were a result of when he tried to save her from her kidnapping. He knew they would both continue to gain more scars as they sought out to protect each other from harm, but he wouldn't have it any other way.

“I love you, Katie.” He leaned in and gave her a soft kiss on her forehead.

She blinked a few times, not caring that she was crying again despite their efforts to “re-hydrate” with ice cream. Her amber eyes lingered as she tried to soak in all of him in this moment bathed in sunset.

“I love you too, Lance.”

Her eyes were lit up from the dying evening light, the gloss from her tears making them appear like liquid honey. He found himself utterly lost in all those varying shades of amber, feeling a calmness wash over his entire being. With Pidge by his side, Lance felt as if everything would turn out alright. “Hey look, you said it,” he said with a proud grin.

“Yeah yeah yeah… now shut up and kiss me.”

He quirked a brow at her, his eyes narrowing slightly as he gave her that mischevious look she knew all too well. "I have something even better in mind. You're not scared of heights, right?"

Something even better than making out? The statement had Pidge anxious for a moment until he mentioned heights, and then she was filled with confusion. "Not particularly, why do you ask-AHHH!"

Lance had gone ghost mid-sentence and before she could understand what was happening, he scooped her up to hold her bridal style and they launched into the air. She wrapped her arms tightly around his neck, clinging to him as her heart raced and her stomach dropped. Once the initial adrenaline wore off, she was able to relax against his chest and move her eyes from the ground and up to look at the sunset.

"You alright??" he asked between laughs at her initial reaction.

"Shut up, you startled me," she said without any ire in her voice. She drank in the view of the distant mountains lit up in the sunset's colors and the town and its lengthening shadows as it passed beneath them. "Wow... this is remarkable," she breathed, feeling the cool evening air against her face and the wind blow through her curls, fluttering her bangs.

"It is, isn't it?" he moved his gaze from her to the horizon. "It's one of the few things I actually really like about being a ghost." 

Her smile widened. "Being able to fly whenever you want? Yeah, I'd call that a perk. Just don't go intangible on me."

"Oh gosh, I might have in my early days," he said with a shudder.

"Good thing we're idiots otherwise we might have been a thing back then and you'd try to pull this stunt off and it would have started with ice cream and ended with pancakes... I would have been the pancake."

"You'd actually probably be more like a waffle with all the chunks-"

"LANCE don't ruin this for me."

He offered her a sheepish grin, chuckling softly. "Sorry. I've got another surprise for you though."

"You're full of them tonight, apparently," she said with a hint of excitement in her tone. She realized they had almost made it to the edge of town. "You're not getting tired are you?" When he turned to look at her with a questioning hum, she elaborated. "You know, carrying me?"

"You weigh close to nothing when I'm a ghost, Pidge," he answered. "I could carry you with one arm just fine." 

"Oh, right. Supernatural strength." They reached the town's boundaries and were now coasting above expanses of empty desert. "Where are we going, anyway?"

"You'll see," he chimed. He was approaching one of the rifts Chulatt had shown him, one that was far bigger than the last rift he had to squeeze through. This one was about the size of a window, just big enough for him and Pidge to slip through. When they transferred to the other side, everything changed in color. Pidge let out a soft gasp when she saw the sunset in the ghost realm in various shades of blues and teals, a few clouds lit up in pale blues and sea greens. With the sky beyond the sunset darkening into a coral, the sunset looked like ocean waves upon the sand.

"It's gorgeous," she said softly, her eyes taking it all in. The trees below were vivid shades of purple and the grass was a deep red. Where the temperature was starting to drop in the human realm with the approaching of night time, it was warming up in the ghost realm. Lance no longer felt as cold and she found herself nuzzling closer into his neck, drinking in his scent. 

They flew around peacefully until the "sun" had fully set, the ghost realm becoming enshrouded in darkness. There were no celestial bodies in the ghost realm which meant no stars dotted the sky, and the only things that provided light were flora that glowed or the ghosts themselves. Lance's luminosity increased significantly as it got darker, but he returned them back through the rift before any ghosts could cause them trouble. When they returned back to the park, Lance stopped and hovered, keeping them up high in the air. 

"So what's your consensus?" he asked with a grin, both of them able to fully look at each other now that he wasn't flying. "Better than making out?" 

She twisted her lips in thought for a moment, then gave him a knowing look. "I've got something _even better_ than flying or making-out!"

"Do you now?" 

"How about both?" she asked, grasping his shoulders to pull herself up and gently press her lips against his to test the waters before she angled her head and applied more pressure, diving into the deep end and immersing herself in him. 

Lance pulled away for a brief moment with a delight shining in his eyes. "I definitely like both," he decided. With a smile, he leaned back in to kiss her, relishing in the warmth of her lips.

Under a night sky full of stars, they finally found relief.

And they found it within each other.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> AHHHHH thanks for enduring the wild ride!! This fic is a complete, mostly unedited MESS and I had to cut so so so many scenes out for the sake of time... but I may write a sequel so I can explore this AU even more and enjoy the benefits of an established relationship. 
> 
> I wrote about 30k of this in _one week_ so I'll be surprised if any of it makes any sense... 
> 
> It's been lots of fun though and I hope you enjoyed reading this! Thank you all for your support and lovely comments, especially to those of you who helped encourage me through the writing process. You know who you are and I appreciate you so much <3


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